Why & How To Add Sticky Ads In A WordPress SideBar

Add Sticky Ads In WordPress SideBar
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The sidebar of your blog is one crucial aspect to get more conversion, and for lead generation. Many bloggers don’t take advantage of their sidebar to full potential, and if you fall in the same category; I recommend you to start taking optimum care of your blog sidebar.

Place elements which help in getting more subscribers or getting more page views. Or, add ads that help in making more money. Just don’t use those useless sidebar widgets like live traffic widget or things that don’t add value for your readers.

Today, I will be talking about one trick which can double your earnings or conversion from your sidebar widget. The sticky sidebar is not a new concept, and you might notice sticky widgets on many blogs including ShoutMeLoud.com.

When you scroll down the page, you will notice that one sidebar widget will stick, and floats along with the scrolling down of the page. This is useful for you to get more attention to one of your sidebar widgets.

You can use it to:

  • Get more clicks on one of your ads.
  • Get more subscribers by sticking your subscription form widget.
  • Get more Facebook likes by making your Facebook Like widget sticky.

And many more practical usage.

In this tutorial, I will share how you can add sticky sidebar widget in WordPress using a simple plugin. This whole process will not take more than 4-5 minutes.

WordPress Sidebar Sticky Plugin To Make your Widget Sticky

Here, I’m sharing two WordPress plugins which let you add a sticky widget. The first one is to make your sidebar widget sticky, and the second one adds the Accordion effect along with Sticky.

 Q2W3 Fixed Widget plugin (Sticky widget)

The Q2W3 Fixed Widget plugin is a free plugin that I use on my blog to offer a sticky widget. This is the simplest plugin and doesn’t require any configuration. Install and activate this plugin (download link), and go to Appearance > Widgets to make any of your sidebar widget sticky.

Sticky Widget WordPress plugin
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Every widget will have a checkbox to make it sticky. You can use it to make one or multiple widgets sticky. Add a checkbox in front of Fixed widget, and click on save. This will make your selected sidebar widget sticky. I would suggest you use it on the last sidebar widget, as it will not overlap with other widgets on your blog sidebar.

Fixed Widget WordPress plugin
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If you want to make some changes in plugin settings, go to Appearance >Fixed widget options, and make changes. If the fixed widget overlaps with your footer, add the height of your footer in “Margin bottom” to avoid it.

Note: Don’t make your AdSense ad widget sticky, as it’s against their ad implementation policy. 

What widgets should you make sticky?

You can use fixed widgets to :

  • Promote any of your top content.
  • Get more email subscribers. Make your email subscription widget fixed.
  • Get more clicks to your CPC ads ( Check ad network policy)
  • Get more clicks to your affiliate ad from your sidebar.

A good idea is to use it for your blog subscription widget, as people who would be scrolling down to read your content, are more likely to subscribe to your blog updates.

Do let me know how you use this fixed widget hack. Which sidebar elements do you promote? Do share this guide with other WordPress bloggers on your social network, as it would help them get more CTR.

Here are a few hand-picked WordPress plugins that you should check out:

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Authored By
A Blogger, Author and a speaker! Harsh Agrawal is recognized as a leader in digital marketing and FinTech space. Fountainhead of ShoutMeLoud, and a Speaker at ASW, Hero Mindmine, Inorbit, IBM, India blockchain summit. Also, an award-winning blogger.

21 thoughts on “Why & How To Add Sticky Ads In A WordPress SideBar”

  1. I was wondering how bluehost widget on shoutmeloud don’t scroll down….
    Thanks for the post…

  2. Joachim

    Thanks for this article and recommending the Q2W3 plugin, Harsh. I just want to add, that the Q2W3 plugin works perfectly with Advanced Ads and it is very easy to make your sidebar ads sticky on that way.

  3. sainani

    HI harsha,
    I knww about this Q2W3 wordpress plugin. But how it works I don’t Know. Any way thanks for writing about this Plugin. Keep Rocking harsha

  4. Shibam Kar

    Its perfect but when I added it it was overlapping my footer section. How to fix this problem?

    1. Harsh Agrawal

      @Shibam For that go to Appearance> Fixed widgets options > And add any value (Ex: 300) to Margin Bottom field.

  5. Pawan Diwakar

    I was wondering how bluehost widget on shoutmeloud don’t scroll down….
    Thanks for the post…

  6. worldHAB

    Thanks, Harsh, just started using it in my site 🙂

    Q2W3 really looks cool and started promoting Affiliate stuffs

    1. Harsh Agrawal

      Happy to help. Looking forward to hearing much more from you.

  7. Deu na Net

    I am using Q2W3 Fixed Widget plugin on my sidebar to stick my affiliate and it gives me good result.
    Nice plugin.

  8. istanbul perde

    this plugin is very good our web site is sticky now, thank you very much

  9. deepa

    Thanks you so much for sharing new information about this plugin.
    I used Q2W3 Fixed Widget plugin On my sidebar to stick my affiliate and it gives me good result. But removed.

  10. Tony

    Very good articel. I think that with this sticky ad sidebar it will improve my affilate earnings. One more time thank you very much 🙂

  11. Syed Shahbaz

    Hi Harsh,

    Thank you so much for this awesome plugin i was looking for this and now i got it from shoutmeloud Keep it up Keep shouting 🙂

  12. Moshiur Rahman

    Hi , Thanks for this great post . I have used Q2W3 Fixed Widget plugin before and had some bad experiences , so can you please suggest some alternative. And also I use addthis for top bar , is it ok or will i use hello bar like you .

  13. Naved Khan

    Hi Harsh,

    Again a great post by. I use Q2W3 plugin and it’s help me lot to get more subscribers to my blog. I love reading your posts and I almost daily reads your blog and your blog helps me a lot in blogging. Thanks for sharing and keep posting great posts. 🙂

  14. Chirag Nayyar

    Hi Harsh,
    I am using Q2W3 Fixed Widget plugin On my sidebar to stick my affiliate and it gives me good result.
    One issue I’m facing is it impact on page load speed. Any idea how to sort it out?

    Thank you

  15. Rahul Biswal

    Hi Harsh,
    Q2W3 is an awesome WordPress widget. But in some cases it creates distraction for users. So I always avoid this widget.

  16. Ngan

    As you’ve mentioned, it is against adsense policy. for those that still doubt about it, the link can be found at – https://support.google.com/adsense/answer/3394713?hl=en#2

    Part 2: Ad implementation
    Q: I sometimes see ads that are fixed in left or right side while scrolling down. Are they policy violation?
    A: “These ads are referred to as “sticky ads” and they are not permitted. We will take action when we come across this kind of implementation.”

    1. Rafaqat

      Dear NGAN
      only Google Adsense (when used as sticky ads) are affected by the policy. It means u can use any thing except adsense (like referral ads, social media icons, subscribe box,news letter) as sticky widget.

  17. santanu

    Very nice information Harshe. I was aware about Q2W3 widget but not about the another one. We can easily fix the sidebar ad widget to get more click chances with these plugins. But if we put the top plugin sticky then we may not be able to show further info, like popular pages, email subscription box etc. But the way you have used for your website, that is really awesome.

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