How to Extend Your Blog Using Widgets
The mass hysteria of blogging has left many of us asking “what am I supposed to do with this thing”? Blogs are a new concept in society, but with thousands of them popping up daily learning how to use them has become considered almost a requirement for today’s website owners.
One way to improve the quality and interactivity of your blog is to add widgets. If you don’t know what a widget is you are bound to hear the term sooner or later. If you have ever really dug into the settings in your wordpress, typepad, or movable type installation you have seen at least something about them.
Think of widgets like blog gadgets, or mini applications that tie into all kinds of websites. Facebook.com for instance is full of widgets. If you have a blockbuster.com account it will tell your facebook widget what movies you want to rent and then show them to all your facebook.com friends (scary, I know!). There is even a facebook widget to take a small picture of your website and put it on your facebook page to show it off to your friends.
Widgets connect a website service to another location.
The newest widget I decided to add to this blog is BlogRush. Blog Rush is a website that offers a service to help drive traffic to your blog. You put the sleek little widget on your blog and it shows headlines from blogs with similar content to your visitors. Meanwhile the same thing is happening all over the web and your blog is getting shown all over the blogosphere.
Where to find Widgets?
You can find them all over, but a great place to look is on the website for your blogging engine. The wordpress plugin directory, or the movable type plugins are a great place to start.
In the next post we will discuss adding extras to your blog, plugins, plugins…. plugins.
