Nick the Geek

Genesis Featured Widget Amplified adds additional functionality to the Genesis Featured Posts Widget. Specifically it:
<ul>
<li>Supports Custom Post Types</li>
<li>Supports Custom Taxonomies</li>
<li>Exclude Term by ID field</li>
<li>Supports Pagination</li>
<li>Supports Meta Key Values</li>
<li>Supports Sorting by Meta Key</li>
<li>Multiple Hooks and Filters for adding additional content</li>
</ul>
This plugin requires the <a href="http://studiopress.com" rel="nofollow ugc">Genesis Theme Framework</a> 
While the plugin will work on the HTML5 “Pro” themes, the HTML markup only supports the older XHTML themes at this time. It is not recommended for use on the new HTML5 themes.
Thanks to David Decker, this plugin is translation ready. German translation files included.
<h3>Special Thanks</h3>
I owe a huge debt of gratitude to all the folks at StudioPress, their themes make my life easier.
Gary Jones (aka GaryJ) provided guidance on several issues related to debugging and documentation

Genesis Featured Widget Amplified

Genesis Featured Posts with support for custom post types, taxonomies, and so much more

iandbanks

Feature Me CTA Widget is a simple widget that allows you to turn any page or post on your website into a call to action (cta).It pulls the pages and posts from the WordPress database and allows a user to choose one to display an excerpt and featured image in a widget area. Use this widget to feature prominent articles, or promote actions on the website.
IT’S EASY TO USE. If your theme uses widgets, you can use Feature Me. Just select the post or page you want to feature in any widget area, customize some preferences and save. Done.
IT SAVES TIME. Forget about endless sticky posts. With Feature Me, you won’t waste your time swapping out sticky 
posts to display your posts and pages in a prominent location. When you use Feature Me, 
you there is no need to code a featured page on your website ever again.

Feature Me – CTA Widget

A simple widget that allows you to feature any page or post on your website.

Genesis Featured Widget Amplified vs Feature Me – CTA Widget