As discussed in this article, there are lots of benefits in using the WordPress web publishing application to build, manage and grow a website or blog. One of these is that WordPress makes it very easy to add content, enhance your site, or rearrange the site’s layout with no programming skills required.
WordPress allows you to quickly and easily add, delete, and control content from your website’s sidebar (and header and footer sections, depending on what theme you are using) using widgets.
Once you know how to use widgets, you can easily add things to your site like:
- nested list of your web pages
- categories
- archived published posts
- menus that display only the pages you choose
- links to external sites
- links to your recent posts
- post comments
- advertising
- user testimonials
- surveys
- RSS feed items
- registration box
- product images
- social media share buttons
- display widgets from external sites (e.g. Facebook friends)
- administrative forms (e.g. login, register, etc.)
(Widgets make managing and using WordPress easy)
To learn more about what WordPress widgets are, how they work and how using widgets can help you expand the functionality of your website, go here:
In this step-by-step tutorial series you are going to learn how to use and configure a number of commonly-used WordPress widgets.
How To Use WordPress Widgets
What You Need To Know First
Before configuring and using widgets, let’s first go over some of the basics of using widgets:
Most WordPress Themes Support Widget-Ready Layouts
Most WordPress themes support widgets and provide sections in the theme’s layout where you can add widgets, such as the sidebar, header area, and footer. Depending on what theme you are using, widgets can sometimes also be used below or above the content area …
(Many WP themes provide multiple widget-ready areas)
These widgetized sections correspond to a feature inside the Widget administration area called “Widget Areas” …
(Widget Areas)
Widgets Screen
The Widgets panel displays a list of all the widgets that can be used on your site.
On the right-hand side of the window, you can see all “active” widgets …
(Widgets can be activated or deactivated with drag and drop ease)
Available widgets can be activated or deactivated using drag & drop.
Widgets dragged from the Available Widgets section to widget areas like your sidebar, footer, etc. instantly become active.
The Widgets area also includes an Inactive Widgets section that lets you remove widgets that you no longer want on your site. Inactive widgets do not lose their settings.
Rearrange WordPress Widgets Using Drag & Drop
You can easily add new functionality to your site, or activate, deactivate, rearrange and delete widgets using simple drag & drop in your Widgets section …
(Rearrange your site’s widgets using drag-and-drop)
You can also easily rearrange your theme’s layout using drag-and-drop.
For example, in the image below, the widgets have already been configured to show the following:
- A newsletter subscription form,
- A click for support banner, and
- ’Click to call’ feature from a widgetized WP plugin (i.e. a WordPress plugin that adds an accompanying widget to your site) …
(Widgets control the order certain features on your site display)
If you look inside this site’s Widget area, you will see that these features correspond to the order of widgets inside the active widget area …
If we reorganize these widgets in the Sidebar Widget Area using drag and drop …
(Drag & drop to rearrange widgets in your widget area)
The widgets have now been reordered in your sidebar …
As you can see, this instantly reorganizes the layout of the site’s sidebar.
Rearranging sidebar layout using widgets can help improve visitor experience.
Note in the screenshot below that the ‘click to call’ function (3) is now at the top of the sidebar, and the ‘contact us’ banner (2) has been moved to the place above the newsletter opt-in form (1) …
(Reorganizing sidebar elements with widgets can improve your site’s visitor experience)
Deleting Widgets From Your Sidebar
Removing widgets from the sidebar is really easy.
For example, let’s show you how to remove the Search widget from your sidebar navigation section …
(Search widget)
To remove a widget from an active Widget area, you can either open up the widget and click the Delete link …
(Delete a widget)
Or just drag the widget out of the Active Widgets section and into the Inactive Widgets area …
(Removing your widgets)
Repeat this process for any widgets you want to remove from your sidebar navigation menu. You can always restore widgets by dragging them back into the active widgets area.
Widget Settings
Many widgets offer a number of options that allow you to further customize them. This can include things like hiding information from users, displaying additional forms, fields, or information, 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, delete your widget from the “Active Widgets” section, close the widget, or click on the triangle to collapse the widget settings …
(Widget settings)
Some widgets provide users with little to no configuration options, or they may only allow you to add an optional title …
(Some widgets provide users with little to no customizable options)
Theme Customizer
Depending on the theme you choose, you can also preview any changes live without actually making changes to your site. This way, you can be sure that you are happy with what you see before committing anything to your website.
Widget management is a great 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 prior to publishing any changes you’ve made (and avoid making errors), or configure widgets on the fly using the Widget editor screen.
(preview widget changes live in the Customize feature)
Wherever you are on the front-end just calick the Customize link in the toolbar …
(Customize link in the toolbar)
This will bring you to the Customizer feature in the backend.
You can do several edits to the widgets in preview mode (like adding, removing and moving widgets around), and everything is done in real time. If you are happy with the results, click the “Save and Publish” button and your changes will then be instantly applied and reflected on the site’s frontend.
(Widget management – work in preview mode)
After saving your changes, WordPress will automatically update the widget settings and display your latest configuration to your site visitors.
Since the WordPress theme you choose affect how elements display on your site, we recommend that you install the theme first before configuring widgets.
Also, remember to use the WordPress Customizer to preview all changes. This saves you from having to keep two browsers open while you go through this tutorial.
Now that you know the basics of using widgets, let’s start configuring a number of frequently-used sidebar widgets in WordPress.
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This is the end of part one of this series of tutorials.
To continue, click here:
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"If you're new to WordPress, this can stand on its own as a training course and will stay with you as you progress from beginner to advanced and even guru status." - Bruce (Columbus, Ohio)
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