In Part One of this tutorial series, we explained how to use WordPress widgets and in Part 2, you learned how to configure a text widget.
In this section we will continue configuring other commonly-used sidebar widgets.
How To Add A Post Categories Widget To Your Sidebar Navigation Area
Now that you have configure a text widget containing a clickable contact button, let’s configure a widget for Post Categories.
By default, the Categories widget already displays on the sidebar area. All you need to do, therefore, is place this widget wherever you want your post categories to display by clicking and dragging it in your sidebar area …
(Post Categories widget)
your post categories …
(WordPress Post Categories Panel)
Note: Using WordPress post categories will be covered in separate tutorials.
Let’s configure the Categories widget settings as shown below:
- In Title: type something that will make sense to visitors, for example, “Choose A Topic…” (1)
- If you have too many categories, check Display as dropdown (this significantly reduces the length of the content by displaying all categories inside a drop-down menu). If you plan to publish posts under a few categories only, then leave the Display as dropdown box unticked. (2)
- Leave the default settings for the remaining options, or see the additional notes on configuring this widget below.
- Click Save to update your settings …
(WordPress Categories widget settings)
Load the site in your web browser or refresh your page to see how your sidebar categories will display to your visitors …
(WordPress Categories widget added to sidebar navigation section)
Tips:
- Change the default Uncategorized post category to something more meaningful.
- If you use nested categories on your site, you may want to check the Show hierarchy box, otherwise leave this box unchecked.
- To display the number of posts published in each category on your site, tick the Show post counts check box …
(Category widget options – Post Count Enabled vs Post Count Disabled)
Add A Recent Posts Widget To Your Sidebar
The Recent Posts widget displays in your sidebar by default. All you need to do is configure your widget.
Click on your Recent Posts widget title bar to configure its settings …
(Recent Posts widget)
There is really very little to set up in this widget. You can add a title, select the number of posts to display and display post dates. If you want to use the default Number of posts to show setting, then just leave the widget as is, otherwise change the number of posts and click Save …
(Recent Posts widget settings)
The most recent number of posts you’ve specified will now display to visitors on your sidebar navigation section …
(Recent Posts widget displayed on sidebar)
A step-by-step tutorial is provided on creating posts in WordPress here: How To Create A Post In WordPress
Add A Pages Widget To Your Sidebar Navigation Section
Next, we’ll add a widget to your sidebar showing links to your pages.
Find a Pages widget in the Available Widgets section …
(Pages Widget)
Drag the Pages widget to your active widget area …
(Inserting a Pages widget into your sidebar)
The Pages widget lets you configure the following settings:
- Title: Add a title to the widget (e.g. “Useful Sections“) (1)
- Sort by: Sort how your pages display: by title (i.e. alphabetically), by page order, or by page ID. (2)
- Exclude: Hide selected pages on your sidebar area (3) …
(WordPress Pages Widget settings)
By default, pages are displayed by title in alphabetical order. If you want to display pages using another option, then select a different method from the Sort by: drop-down menu …
(Pages Widget settings – item sorting options)
To exclude pages from displaying on the sidebar, simply type their Page Ids separated by commas into the Exclude field of the Pages widget …
(WordPress Pages Widget settings – exclude pages by ID)
A step-by-step tutorial is provided on finding a post or page ID in WordPress here: How To Find The Unique ID Of WordPress Posts And Pages
Click the Save button when done and then click Close at the bottom of the widget box to minimize your widget.
Links to your site’s main pages will now show on the sidebar navigation menu …
(Pages Widget on sidebar)
Tip: You can add multiple Pages widgets to the sidebar. This is helpful if you need to display separate page groups on the sidebar (e.g. “Products”, “Legal Pages” etc.)
Display Links On The Sidebar Section
Now, we’ll add a Links widget to display external links on the sidebar navigation menu.
Before adding the Links widget to the sidebar section, we recommend configuring your Links feature inside the WP dashboard …
(WordPress Links section)
Note: Setting up and using WordPress Links will be explained in separate tutorials.
To add the widget, find a Links widget in the Available Widgets section …
(Links Widget)
Drag it to your sidebar …
(Making Links Widget active)
The widget offers a number of configurable options, including the ability to specify what information to show about your links and how many links you want to display on the sidebar …
(Links Widget Settings)
You can add as many separate ‘Link Widgets’ to your sidebar as you want. As you will see in a moment, this lets you create and display specific lists of links on your site …
(Add Multiple WordPress Links Widgets To Your Sidebar Section)
You can sort links by Link title, Link rating, Link ID, or display links in Random order …
(Links widget: ‘Sort by:’ drop-down menu)
You can also create and display a list of items for a specific category, by selecting a link category from the ‘Select Link Category’ drop-down menu …
( Links widget: ‘Select Link Category’ drop-down menu)
When you have finished configuring your Links Widget, click the Save button …
(External links added to sidebar navigation area)
As the above example shows, you can display specific links to your site visitors (e.g. a list for a specific link category only), and add multiple lists of links to the WordPress sidebar section.
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This is the end of part three of this series of tutorials on how to use WordPress widgets.
Click here to view the rest of this tutorial:
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