Since it's launch back in 2006, Twitter has become a leading pioneer in the world of social media. Bloggers in particular find this service an invaluable tool for syndication, news stories and community conversation.For this post, I have rounded up 16 of the most useful tools, tips and free resources to help you get the most out of Twitter through your Blogger powered blog.
Display your Latest Tweets
Visitors to your blog may also enjoy reading your Tweets, particularly if they are of relevance to your blog's niche subject.Here is a selection of the best tools for displaying Twitter updates in your Blogger layout:
The Official Twitter Badges
Twitter provides an animated "Profile" badge which you can use to display your latest updates as a widget in your blog layout:
Another alternative is the Twitter "MySpace" gadget, which uses Flash to create a different appearance to the gadget:
Blogger Widgets and Gadgets
Another way to display your Twitter updates is to install a Blogger widget or gadget in your layout. These can be configured to display as few or many Tweets as you choose, and require only your Twitter username to install:Simple Twitter Updates Widget
This was the first Twitter application I created for use with Blogger blogs and still remains one of the most popular tools on the site! To install, simply fill out the form and click "Add Widget" to install automatically in your layout.
Twitter Gadget for Blogger (EN)
This gadget works in much the same way as the Twitter Updates widget but is simpler to install and can be reconfigured after installation.
Twitter Updates Gadget (ES)
Daniel Ikeda has made a Spanish translation of my Twitter Gadget for easy installation.
TwitSig - Your Tweets in Pictures
TwitSig is an interesting free service which allows you to display your latest Twitter update as an image. You can add this in your layout as either an HTML/JavaScript widget (using the code generated on the TwitSig homepage) or as an Image gadget using one of the alternative backgrounds.Here's an example of the default Twitsig badge:
This one uses magnets:
Here's another using a fortune cookie:
Visit TwitSig to generate your own updating Twitter updates image.
Add a "Follow Me" Badge
To encourage your blog readers to follow you on Twitter, try adding a "Follow Me" badge which links to your Twitter profile page.
Here are some useful tools and badges which you can use to add a linked "Follow Me" badge to your Blogger layout:
Twitter Follow Badge by Go2Web"0.com
Here's a new and interesting way to add a non-intrusive "follow me" badge to your site, like this:
The badge can be configured for different colour schemes, height from the top of the page and left/right alignment.
To add the badge to your Blogger blog, visit the TwitterFollowBadge page and fill in the form to your requirements. This will generate some JavaScript code which you should add just before the closing </body> tag in your Blogger template. However, in it's native form this code will not display in Blogger!
Instead, we have two options:
- Paste the JavaScript into an HTML/JavaScript widget instead
- Replace <-- and --> in the generated code with <-- and --> (this enables the script to function correctly and display the badge in your page)
TwitterButtons.com
TwitterButtons offers several pages of free "follow" buttons to help your blog readers follow you on Twitter:
Twitter Buttons by Vincentabry.com
This site offers 31 different styles of Twitter buttons which you can add to your blog. Although the site is not in English, the Twitter buttons are.
To add these to Blogger easily, use your favourite image in a Picture gadget in the layout, then link this to your Twitter profile:
Add "Tweet This" Links to your Blog Posts
Twitter is an excellent service for syndicating blog posts and useful or interesting articles. Help your blog readers share their favourite posts on Twitter by providing a "Tweet This" link for each of your blog posts.Here are three different ways you could do this:
Add a simple "Tweet This" link
The simplest of all Twitter syndication links is a text link which uses the URL and title of your blog post:
Go to Layout>Edit HTML in your Blogger dashboard and check the "Expand Widget Templates" box.
Then using your browser search function, locate the following line of code (or similar):
<div class='post-footer'><a expr:href='"http://twitter.com/home?status=Reading " + data:post.title + " @YOUR-TWITTER-USERNAME " + data:post.url' title='Tweet it on Twitter'>Tweet This</a>Then save your template. This will add a "Tweet This" link in the post-footer section beneath each blog post. Readers can click this link to post a pre-filled template "Tweet" like this:
Image based "Tweet This" Link
If you'd prefer to use a stylish button or larger image link, you can simply replace the text from the previous example with an image tag, like this:<a expr:href='"http://twitter.com/home?status=Reading " + data:post.title + " @YOUR-TWITTER-USERNAME " + data:post.url' title='Tweet it on Twitter'><img src="http://image-host.com/your-image-link.jpg" alt="Tweet This" /></a>
Using Short URLs in "Tweet This" Links
Many of us use lengthy domain names which take up much of Twitter's 140 character limit for the tweeting of posts.A while ago I posted a tutorial explaining how to enable short URLs for "Tweet This" links using Bit.ly. This explains how to add a similar text/button/combination link for each of your Blogger posts which adds a shortnened URL to the Twitter post template instead of the regular, lengthier one.
Enable "Tweetbacks" in your template
Dan Zarella's original "Tweetbacks" script is JavaScript based and can be used in Blogger templates to display tweets about your post. It is very easy to install and requires no customization (unless you wish to style how the tweetbacks are displayed).
To add "Tweetbacks" to your Blogger blog, simply copy the code below and paste this in your template where you would like the Tweetbacks to appear:
<script src="http://danzarrella.com/tb.js"></script> Another possibility is to add Tweetbacks beneath the "Links to this post" section of your template, effectively grouping these tweets with backlinks to each individual post.
To achieve this, go to Layout>Edit HTML and check the "Expand widget templates" box. Then search for the following line in your template:
<b:includable id='backlinks' var='post'><h4>Tweetbacks<h4>
<script src="http://danzarrella.com/tb.js"></script>Note: you must configure "Backlinks" to "Show" in the Settings>Comments section of your dashboard to enable this method to work.
Add TwitPic Updates to your Sidebar
TwitPic enables us to share images to Twitter, which can be posted by phone, using the TwitPic API or directly from the TwitPic site.I've developed a gadget which you can use to display your recent TwitPic updates in your Blogger layout which is easy to install and can be configured to your needs:
Add "Real Time" Twitter Updates
Being a fast, virtually instantaneous stream of updates on any given subject, many of us like to keep up with references, news and re-tweets in real-time, rather than having to update or revisit Twitter search at periodic intervals.Here are two highly useful gadgets for blogger which can be used to display real-time updates in your actual blog layout:
Twitter Search
Developed by 32Hours.com, this gadget offers a stream of updates for a given search term, hash tag or username.Simply add the gadget to your blog and change the terms for search after installation (your readers can use this too!):
Juitter Gadget - real time updates with configurable search terms
Based on the excellent Juitter JQuery plugin by Rodrigo Fante, this gadget enables real-time Twitter updates based on the search terms you specify on installation. You can choose to display tweetbacks referencing your Twitter username, a particular search term and even combinations of terms:
This gadget does not contain ads or added links, and can be configured to display exactly as you want.
Click here to add this Juitter gadget to your blog.
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