How to Enable Your Visitors to Add Their Twitter ID to Comments

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Most blogs allow visitors to leave a comment that includes their website URL but you can also allow visitors to promote their Twitter ID when they write a comment.

The WordPress plugin that provides this function is called TwitterLink Comments.  Install this plugin on your blog.

Not sure how to install plugins to your WordPress blog?  Click here for help.

After the plugin has been installed open the WordPress admin panel for your blog, and in the left-hand sidebar go to Settings and click on TwitterLink Settings.

Make sure that the Add Twitter Field Automatically option is enabled, then scroll down and choose where you would like the Twitter link positioned, and other formatting.

You can experiment with these settings quite a bit until you find a layout and style that you like.  Here are the settings I use on this blog.

twitterlinkcomments-settings

I also added this code to my theme’s CSS file to control the styling even further.

.twitlink {
      border: none;
      background: url('images/twitterlinks.png') top left no-repeat;
      padding: 5px 5px 5px 68px;
      }

Once you are happy with the settings click on Save Changes.

Now open one of your blog posts in a web browser and you will see the new Twitter field in your comment form.

twitterlinkcommentsYou may need to log out of your WordPress account and post a comment as a regular guest to fully test the changes.

Want more tips on integrating Twitter and WordPress? Click here for a free download of my Twitter and WordPress Integration Guide

Image Credit: Flickr

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Leave a Comment

{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }

Reed Porter { December 21, 2009 at 12:15 pm

Great post! Love the step-by-step setup instructions. It always frustrates me when I get a new plugin or theme and have no clue what the settings do. e.g. A 3rd subserviant wiget area.

Quick note: You WWSGD plugin seems to point to exchangeserverpro.com’s feed.

Reply

Paul Cunningham { December 21, 2009 at 12:26 pm

Hi Reed, thanks for your comment and for pointing out that mistake! The perils of copy/paste code :-)

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Tom - StandOutBlogger.com { January 3, 2010 at 9:10 am

That is awesome! Twitter is a great tool and to combine it with you blog is even handier.

Reply

Andy { June 27, 2010 at 11:04 am

Thanks for that info. Adds another layer of integration of twitter and wordpress. good combo

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