In Part 1 of this tutorial series, we cover the basics of how to use WordPress widgets.
In this section you are going to learn how to configure various commonly-used sidebar widgets in WordPress.
Configuring Commonly-Used WordPress Sidebar Widgets
In a default WordPress installation, your site comes with a number of built-in active widgets, such as widgets that let you display links to your site’s pages, filter posts by categories, text or HTML banners, add a search box, etc.
(In a default WordPress installation, your site comes with a number of active widgets)
Configuring Sidebar Widgets In WordPress In WordPress: Tutorial
In this tutorial, you are going to add, configure and reorder a number of frequently-used widgets, including:
- Adding a clickable Support graphic linking visitors to the support page.
- Adding a Categories section with a drop down menu.
- Adding a Recent Posts section to display your latest posts.
- Adding a list of your site’s most important Pages.
- Display Links on the sidebar.
- Add an RSS Feed section.
- Add a Tag Cloud.
- Add and configure an Archives section to the sidebar section.
The Widgets screen is located inside the WordPress admin area and can be easily accessed from the WordPress admin menu by clicking on Appearance > Widgets …
(Widgets Menu)
This brings up the Widgets section in your web browser …
(Widgets Section)
Let’s get started …
Add A Text Widget To Your Blog Sidebar Section
Text widgets are versatile …
(WordPress Text widget)
Rich Text Widget
From version 4.8 onward, WordPress has added native rich-text editing capabilities to text widgets …
(Rich Text Widget)
This lets you quickly and easily format text, create lists, add emphasis, and insert links into your sidebar text …
(Format text easily with the new text widget)
Text widgets can be used to add notices, social media buttons, news and updates and more to your site … simply by typing in text or pasting HTML into the content area. You can also give the widget a title. Remember to save your settings when done …
(Text widgets are extremely versatile!)
Example: Add A Clickable Support Button To The Sidebar Area Using A Text Widget
For this example, let’s set up a clickable help button on the sidebar navigation menu that takes visitors to a page on your site (or an external site, e.g. a helpdesk) where they can contact you for help and support.
First, you will need to create or source a graphic image that visitors can click on …
We’ll set up the clickable button to display at the top of the sidebar area like in the example shown below …
Step 1 – Upload your image.
To display an image on your site, the graphic image must be uploaded to your server. Upload your button graphic to the images folder in your server and note the address of your image location.
For example …
http://www.yourdomain.com/images/supportbutton.jpg
You will use this information in Step 3.
In order for someone to go to your contact page when the help button gets clicked, you will need to either create a contact page, or have an existing destination page already set up (e.g. a helpdesk). We will link the button image to this URL in Step 3 …
Step 2 – Create a contact page.
Create a contact page and note down its URL …
Step 3 – Compose your text widget code.
Don’t worry … this sounds a lot more technical than it is. In simple terms, you just need to create the instructions linking the button image to your destination URL.
Your instructions can be composed in a plain text editor and will look something like this …
- Replace “http://www.yourdomain.com/contact-us” in the code with the URL of your contact page location.
- Replace “http://yourimagelocation.com/img/supportbutton.jpg” in the code with the URL of your image location.
The screenshot below shows which sections of the above code you need to replace with your actual web addresses …
Replace the above URLs and then copy all of the above code to your clipboard when finished.
If you need help understanding basic HTML code, refer to this tutorial:
Now, go back to your Widgets panel …
(Widgets Screen)
Step 4 – Add a Text widget.
Add a Text widget to your sidebar in the location where your button should display.
In the Available Widgets area, select a Text widget …
(Text widget)
Drag your Text widget to the Active Widgets section and release it at the very top of the Widget Area …
(Drag-and-drop your Text widget)
Step 5 – Configure the text widget.
Click on the widget title bar to configure the widget options. Paste the code with the links to your contact page and graphic button into the text widget content area and click save …
Add a heading to the widget if you want (e.g. “Need Help?”, “Support”, etc.) and paste the code with the correct destination URLs into the large text box, then click the save button …
Note: Remember to test all links before pasting scripts into your Text Widget, or your button will not work.
*** If using WordPress version pre-4.8 ***
If adding text without formatting tags like paragraph breaks, you may want to tick the Automatically add paragraphs box to wrap each block of text in paragraphs (note: this is not necessary if you’re typing in HTML code like we’re doing in this tutorial).
Here is some text with Automatically add paragraphs box not ticked …
(Automatically add paragraphs option not selected)
Here is some text with Automatically add paragraphs box ticked …
(Automatically add paragraphs option ticked)
***
Step 6 – Refresh your browser.
Once you have added your widget and HTML code, visit the front end of your site and refresh your browser. If you have entered all of the links correctly, then your support button will display at the top of the site’s sidebar menu …
(Clickable button widget on blog sidebar)
The above screenshot shows the support contact button in the sidebar of a newly-installed WordPress site.
Step 7 – Test the widget.
The last step is to make sure that the links work. Test your button to make sure that your visitors will go to your help page when they click on the button. You should be taken directly to your support page …
(Test your clickable button)
Tips:
If you want the support page to display in a new browser window when visitors click on the help (so they don’t leave the page they’re in), then change the code from this:
To this (i.e. include the section containing target=”_blank” in the text widget code):
When adding images to your sidebar area, make sure that the width of your image doesn’t exceed the width of the sidebar column, especially if you are using a non-responsive WordPress theme. Note that some themes can display elements differently depending on their templates and layout. Some sidebars may be too wide or too narrow. If the sidebar of your theme is narrower than the width of your graphic images, then you may need to either adjust the image size, or the width of your sidebar column to make the images display correctly on your sidebar section.
(Make sure that the width of the image does not exceed the width of the sidebar column)
More Tips:
- If you don’t want to center your button inside your sidebar, delete the <center> and </center> tags from the beginning and end of the line of code. The image will then be left-aligned.
- Link the help button to any URL you like (e.g. to an external link, helpdesk, FAQ page, etc.) and change this anytime by editing the code in the widget.
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This is the end of part two of this tutorial on using Widgets.
To continue, click here:
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"These tutorials have so much information and are easy to understand. If you use WordPress or plan to in the future these will help you with everything you need to know." - Valisa (Mesa, Arizona)