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Twitter has become one of the most popular ever syndication and networking tools for bloggers. A few readers have asked if it is possible to add a "Tweet This" link to our Blogger templates, and while this was possible, I had not discovered a method of automatically shortening the URL of our blog posts until now. Luckily for us, Bit.ly have created a JavaScript-based solution which shortens the URL to just a few characters and enables bloggers to add a Tweet This link configured for their posts. In this tutorial, I'll explain how you can add this to your Blogger template so your readers can Tweet your posts to their Twitter followers, enabling your Blogger posts to be syndicated to a wider audience. Editing your template to add the Twitter links First of all, you should make a full back-up of your existing template (which you can later restore if you make a mistake in the coding). To do this, go to Layout>Edit HTML in your Blogger dashboard and click on the ...

Blog feeds offer a means of reaching a wider audience and allow our readers to stay up to date with the latest posts. Until recently, we had little control over how our feeds were presented using the Short or Long feed options available in our Blogger dashboards. Short Feeds display only the first 400 words, stripping that content of HTML and images, while Long Feeds display the entire blog post. Now the Blogger team have added a third choice to the length of our feeds , which we can use to display item content in feeds up until the Jump Break in our post . This enables any HTML-based content (such as images and links) will be displayed for each feed item, with a link to read the full item on summarized posts. To enable this new feed setting, go to Settings>Site Feed in your Blogger dashboard. Next to Allow Blog Feeds , choose the option in the drop-down sajian which says Until Jump Break then save this setting: Summarize your Blogger Post Feeds Now any subscribers t...

When using Blogger, the RSS autodiscovery tags for our blog feeds are automatically generated, enabling visitors to easily subscribe for updates by clicking the orange icon in our browser's address bar: Many bloggers use Twitter to promote their website and add an extra stream of conversation to our blog. In addition to adding a Twitter photostream or link to our Twitter profile in our layout, we can add autodiscovery tags to our template, enabling visitors a simple and alternative means of subscribing for updates. It's very easy to add autodiscovery for alternative feeds to our Blogger templates. Simply go to Design>Edit HTML in your Blogger dashboard and locate the closing </head> tag in your template. Immediately before this, paste the following code, replacing YOUR-TWITTER-USERNAME with your own username: <link rel="alternate" type="application/atom+xml" title="Autodiscover your Twitter Feed with Blogger" href="htt...

Facebook has become one of the most popular tools among Bloggers for syndicating blog posts. By adding a stylish Facebook "Like" box beneath your articles in Blogspot, you offer readers a temptingly easy means of sharing your posts with their friends. Aneesh of Blogger Plugins has developed a simple, customizable way of installing a Facebook Like box for each page of your Blogger-based site. This tool is based on the original code and design developed by Mia of Dezign Matterz . I'm using a slightly altered version of this widget here on . In this post, I'll offer an overview of how to install Aneesh/Mia's stylized Facebook Like box, and an additional method for adding a simpler "Like" widget to your Blogger/Blogspot site. How to install a stylized Facebook Like Box Head over to the installation page at Blogger Plugins and fill in the form. You'll need to enter the URL of your Facebook Fan page or profile, and also your desired wid...

RSS feed reader ). To make it even easier for our readers to stay in touch with our sites, the Blogger Team have developed a new, official gadget: Follow by Email . Using Feedburner technology , this new gadget offers a one-click solution for adding an email subscription form to our Blogger-powered blogs. We don't even need to sign up with Feedburner or visit the Feedburner dashboard to configure this for use in our sites! To begin using this new gadget, go to Design>Page Elements in your Blogger dashboard and click "Add a Gadget" in the section where you'd like the email form to appear. In the following menu, select "Follow by Email" from the list of default gadgets which will bring up a pop-up box like this: When setting up the Follow by Email gadget for the first time, a Feedburner Feed URL is created for you. Usually this is based on the name of your blog (so long as this feed name is not already in use). We can change the name of the fe...