This part of the series, will focus on integrating tools/plugins that will help your readers share your content. The easier you make it for your readers to share content, the more likely the will (given other factors too). Now, how you enable them to share, should vary with your specific audience. Meaning, with everything else you do online — always remember your goals and your audience, the right technology will always come after those factors.
photo credit: ajusticenetwork
We won’t cover what compels your readers to share content, that’s a series of posts in and of itself (which I will be covering in the weeks to come). This post is about the possibilities available to you (Wordpress blog owner), to help facilitate sharing and encourage sharing.
Social Sharing Plugins for Wordpress – A Word of Caution
A word of caution before we share with you, please don’t crowd your blog with too many choices. Simplicity is always best and use tools that target your audience and where they would be… Otherwise, what’s the point?
So, with that said, let’s dive in!
Sociable Plugin
This is probably the best and you can see it in action here, among thousands of other blogs. What I like about this plugin is all the links are no-follow (good for your link juice) and you can, if you can work with php, customize the images and their sizes so it’s a bit more unique to your site. The best feature is that you can choose exactly what sites to feature AND the order they appear in.
Share This Plugin
Definitely my next, top pick is the Share This plugin. Same features above, including choosing which sites to include, what order to include them, but you can also customize the look and feel of Share This — making it a great addition to any site. I also like the compact feel of this plugin, it expands to give reader options (including email and others beyond social bookmarking) — so your blog doesn’t get cluttered.
Here’s a look at it on the Gen Y Guide Blog:
Add to Any Plugin
A great plugin, similar to Share This but with two versions — Add to Any Share This and Add to Any Subscribe. Both are drop-down like the Share This plugin and both offer a long list of possibilities for your audience to share and subscribe. (They work independent of each other) One cool thing about Add to Any is that it has smart memory, meaning returning readers will see what they used from the last time. If you have power-user readers, this is kind of a cool feature.
I Love Social Bookmarking Plugin
A very simple and Web 2.0 looking social bookmarking plugin that is a drop-down like the others, so it’s more compact. The only issue I have with this one, is the lack of customization (it looks the same on every blog) and it’s options don’t include a full range of social sharing like the others.
Download I Love Social Bookmarking Plugin
Social Drop-Down Plugin
Social Drop-Down is yet another compact plugin that allows users to social bookmark. Like I Love Social Bookmarking, this plugin does not include the full breadth of social sharing beyond bookmarking.
Download Social Drop-Down Plugin
Follow Me Plugin
Follow me plugin isn’t directly connected to your readers sharing, but to connect with you across social sites, which can indirectly help you build a better relationship with them, leading them back to your blog. Again, it’s a compact drop-down and there are very little options for customization – but a good simple plugin nonetheless.
Finally… Two of My Fave Social Plugins…
Meet Your Commenters Plugin
I love this plugin, because I haven’t yet found one that is based on the Google Social Graph API, making it more complete… Meet Your Commenters Plugin adds a section to your dashboard that shows you the social sites your commenter is signed up for. After someone comments, you can go to those sites, directly from Wordpress and connect with them. A great way to take another connection step with them outside of your blog.
obSocial Bookmarker Plugin
This is a super groovy plugin that adds user-submitted social bookmarking links at the bottom of each post, to make it much easier for your current reader to submit the post to the same site. There is a call function to customize exactly where you want it (like if you’re using Thesis), and there is also automatic positioning through the plugin settings.
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Dig in and start adding social and sharing features to your blog — watch your blog readership grow. Don’t get out of control and clutter everything up, but done wisely and with consideration of your readers, you can get some serious traction out of your readers’ natural propensity to want to share 
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Looking forward to connecting and sharing with you!
Maria 
More Sharing Feature Resources Across the Net
Top 35 Sharing Plugins for Wordpress
Social Sharing Plugin for Wordpress
Top 20 Social Bookmarking Plugins for Wordpress
Top 16 Social Plugins for Wordpress
Top Ten Wordpress Plugins for Social Media
This is the third of a 5 part series looking at how to build a sense of community on your blog.
Part 1: Building Blog Community with Comment Feature
Part 2: Building Blog Community with Social Media Features
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