Note: In this series I’ll delve into some of the better plugins available for WordPress that I am already using, or about to start using. I’m aiming to highlight 30 of the better plugins.
I had been been fighting against getting a Facebook account for my online eLearning activity but, after seeing some of the content and contacts I was missing out on I bit the bullet and created a Facebook account and Facebook page.
I set Facebook and Twitter to talk to each other so I could update one and the other easily, but then came the question of linking this WordPress blog to Facebook. Well, of course it can be done (I don’t believe I’m the first person to think of this) so all I had to do was search and see what people were saying about the different plugins.
The two that immediately leapt out of the page was WordBook (WordPress and Facebook, get it?) but on reading a few blog posts from users it looked a little underwhelming when compared to a similarly titled Wordbooker.
Wordbooker;
“… allows you to cross-post your blog posts to your Facebook Wall. You can also “cross pollinate” comments between Facebook and your WordPress blog.”
Once the plugin has been installed and linked to your Facebook account/page you can configure it so that when you post to your blog your Facebook account is automatically updated with an extract of your post with links back to the original article; so all your Facebook friends will be notified that you’ve written a new blog post automatically without you having to do anything. Sweet!
Here is a gallery of images, just some screen shots from the various settings that are available to modify – I suggest some careful testing of them in order to get it looking and working properly!
And this is what it looks like on my Facebook Page: eLearning Blog Don’t Waste Your Time;
The admin panel gives you the option on how the posts are displayed, on what image is used (if any) from the post and also how the posts are introduced in Facebook. What I haven’t seen working yet is the ability for Wordbooker to cross-pollinate the comments, from the WordPress blog to Facebook, and also Facebook to WordPress. I’m sure it does work, so it’s either something in the set-up that isn’t set properly or something I’ve missed in the permissions in Facebook.
One aspect of the plugin I do like, however, and is working is that ability to re-publish an article to Facebook when you edit it in WordPress. You can set this to be always on, so each and every edit will republish to your Facebook account or Page, but I think it’s better set as manual so you have complete control!
Anyway, there you have it; this is one of the better plugins I have working on this (and other) WordPress blogs that means I am in partial control of a couple of different Social Media Networks all from this very blog.
If you are using Wordbooker, and want to share your experience, or indeed have tried it and prefer another plugin, please help us all out and leave a comment below.