As we have discussed in this post, there are so many great things about using the WordPress CMS platform to build and grow your website or blog. One of these is that you can easily add content, enhance your website, and reconfigure the layout of your site without web coding skills and knowledge required.
WordPress lets you quickly and easily insert, remove, and control various types of content on your site’s sidebar menu (or header and footer sections too, depending on what theme you use) using widgets.
Once you know how to use widgets, you can easily add things to your site’s sidebar area (plus headers and footers and other areas, depending on the WordPress theme you have installed) like:
- list of your web pages
- blog post categories
- archives
- custom menus
- links to external sites
- posts that you want to promote
- user comments
- image banners
- testimonials
- poll results
- RSS content
- newsletter subscription form
- image galleries
- social media share buttons
- add widgets from other sites (e.g. Facebook friends)
- administrative forms (e.g. login, register, etc.)
(Widgets help make managing and using WordPress easier)
To learn more about what WordPress widgets are, how they work and why widgets make managing your site easier, go here:
In this step-by-step tutorial series you are going to learn how to use and configure various commonly-used widgets in WordPress.
How To Use WordPress Widgets
What You Need To Know First
Before we start configuring and using widgets, it helps to first make sure that you understand some of the basics about using widgets:
Most WordPress Themes Support Widgetized Layouts
Most WordPress themes support widgets and provide widget-ready sections in the theme’s layout where you can add widgets, such as the sidebar, header area, and footer. Depending on the theme installed on your site, widgets can also show up below or above the content area …
(Many themes offer users multiple widget sections)
These widget-ready sections correspond to a feature inside your Widget management screen called “Widget Areas” …
(Widget Areas)
Widgets Panel
The Widgets screen displays a list of all the widgets that are currently available for use on your site.
The right-hand section of the window displays the “active” widgets …
(Activate or deactivate widgets with drag and drop ease)
Available widgets can be made Active or Inactive using drag-and-drop.
Widgets dragged from the Available Widgets section to widget areas like the sidebar, footer, etc. become immediately active and available for use.
In addition, your Widgets screen includes an Inactive Widgets section that lets you remove widgets that you no longer want on your site. Inactive widgets retain their settings.
Reorganize Widgets With Drag & Drop
You can easily add, activate, deactivate, reorder and delete widgets by dragging and dropping items inside the Widgets area …
(Rearrange widgets using drag and drop)
You can also easily reorder your theme’s layout by using drag-and-drop.
For example, take a look at the image below. In this example site, the widgets have already been configured to show the following:
- An opt-in form,
- A click for support button, and
- A ‘click to call’ feature from a widgetized WordPress plugin (i.e. a WordPress plugin with an accompanying widget) …
(Widgets control how certain features on your site display)
If we took a peek inside the Widget area, you would see that the front end features display on the site in the same order as their corresponding widgets have been arranged in the back-end widget area …
If we change the above widgets in the Sidebar Widget Area by dragging & dropping some of these widgets around …
(Drag and drop to rearrange widgets in your widget area)
The widgets have now been reordered in the sidebar navigation area …
As you can see, this immediately reorganizes the layout of your site’s sidebar.
Reorganizing sidebar layout using widgets can help to improve visitor experience.
Note in the screenshot below that the ‘click to call’ feature (3) is now the first item on the sidebar, and the support section (2) can now be found above the newsletter sign-up form (1) …
(Rearrange sidebar elements with widgets to improve your site’s visitor experience)
Deleting Widgets From Your Sidebar
Deleting widgets from the sidebar navigation section is really easy.
For example, let’s show you how to remove the Search widget from the sidebar …
(WordPress Search widget)
To delete an active widget, either expand the widget settings and click the Delete link …
(Deleting WordPress widgets)
Or just drag the widget out of the Active Widgets area and into the Inactive Widgets area …
(Remove widgets)
Repeat this process for any other widgets you want removed from the sidebar. You can always reactivate a widget by dragging it back into the active widgets area.
Widget Settings
Many widgets can be customized further. This includes making certain types of information hidden to your site visitors but visible to registered users, displaying additional forms, fields, or data, specifying dimensions of sidebar images, videos, etc.
Clicking on the little triangle in the corner of a widget toggles between expanding and collapsing the item and displays the widget’s settings …
(Toggles expand/collapse widget settings)
When the widget expands, you can change and save your settings, remove your widget from the “Active Widgets” section, close the widget, or click on the triangle to collapse the widget …
(Widget settings)
Some widgets provide users with little to no customization, or they may only allow you to add something like an optional title …
(Some widgets give you little to no customizing options)
Widget Previews
Depending upon the theme you have installed on your site, you’re also able to preview any changes live without making actual changes to your site. This way, you can be sure that you like your customizations before making any permanent changes to your site.
Widget management is a valuable feature of WordPress. You can work in preview mode inside the WordPress Theme Customizer screen (Appearance > Customize) and see how your widget content will appear before publishing any changes (and avoid making errors), or manage widgets on the fly using the Widget editor area.
(preview widget changes live in the Customize feature)
Wherever you are on the front-end just calick the Customize link in the toolbar …
(Toolbar Customize Link)
This brings you to the Customizer feature in the backend.
You can do many edits and adjustments in preview mode (like inserting, removing and moving widgets around), and it’s all done in real time. If you are happy with what you have done, click the “Save and Publish” button and your changes will be instantly applied and reflected on your site to visitors.
(Widget management – configure widgets on the fly!)
After saving changes, all changes made to widgets will be automatically updated.
Because WordPress Themes can display elements differently on your site, we recommend installing your theme first before configuring widgets on your sidebar menu.
Also, remember to use the Customizer feature to preview your changes. This saves you from having to keep two browsers open while you work through this tutorial.
Now that you know the basics of using widgets, the next step is to begin configuring various commonly-used WordPress sidebar widgets.
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This is the end of section 1 of this series of tutorials.
Click here to continue:
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