How to Add a PayPal Donate Button to Your Blogger Blog

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If you are interested in receiving a few bucks in exchange for all the hours and the hard work you are putting into your blog, then you might want to consider adding a PayPal donate button to the sidebar of your Blogger blog. Adding a donation button will (hopefully) encourage some of your loyal readers to say a big thank you for helping them out and/or entertaining them. Not everyone will donate, but once in a while a generous soul will voluntarily give you a little financial encouragement.

In this tutorial I shall show you how to add a PayPal donate button to the sidebar of your Blogger blog. There will be no need to change the template, so this should be fairly easy.

1. Sign up if you do not already have a PayPal account.

2. Login to your PayPal account.

3. Click on the Merchant Portal tab.

4. Choose Donations from the list of key features displayed in the right sidebar of the PayPal Website Payments Standard option (the first of 3 payment solutions).

5. From the PayPal Create a Payment Button screen choose Donation from the dropdown menu at Step 1 if it is not already selected.

6. Stick with the default button unless there is a special need to customize it.

7. Choose the currency depending on your needs and location.

8. Choose the Donors enter their own contribution amount radio button unless you want to have a set amount.

9. Make sure that the Secure merchant account ID radio button is selected. This will prevent spammers from getting hold of your email address.

10. At Step 2 it is worth saving your button.

11. At Step 3 customize your checkout page by allowing donors to write a short comment by selecting the Yes radio button to special instructions to seller.

12. Select the No radio button for customer's shipping address.

13. Select the Create Button button.

14. Once PayPal has created the donate button code copy it by right clicking your mouse and choosing copy (Ctrl + C).

15. Log out of PayPal.

16. Login to your Blogger account if you are not already logged in.

17. Go to Layout --> Page Elements.

18. Click on the Add a Gadget link in the sidebar.

19. Choose the HTML/Javascript widget from the list provided.

20. Paste the PayPal donate button code into the Content box of the dialog box that appears by placing the mouse inside the box and right clicking the mouse and then paste (alternatively Ctrl + V).

21. Select a title like "Buy Me a Coffee Today!" or whatever you think works best.

22. Click on the Save button.

23. Drag and drop your new donation gadget into the spot you want it to appear in.

24. Hit the Save button to make sure your changes are saved.

25. Click View Blog to check your new PayPal donate button in the sidebar of your Blogger blog.

26. Try out your new PayPal donate button by clicking on it. You should be be taken to the PayPal Checkout screen.

In this post I have walked you through the steps necessary to add a PayPal donate button to your Blogger blog.

Good luck!

 

Technorati-Tags: paypal,donate button,add gadget,monetize blog

Adding an AddThis Button to Blogger

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The AddThis button is a widely recognized and respected tool for spreading the content of your website or blog across the web by making it easier for your visitors to bookmark and share it with others, again...and again.

This simple and surprisingly powerful button is easy to install and provides valuable analytics about the bookmarking and sharing of your visitors, thereby enabling you to optimize your website or blog for a number of social networks like technorati, digg, stumble upon, etc.

The AddThis button will help create a buzz for your site, resulting in and increased popularity and a higher PageRank.

Now, how to install it?

First, please visit the AddThis.com homepage and register in order to get the code you need to insert to get the button. Follow the steps on the AddThis webpage to select the type and style of the button you want to add to your blog/site. Then copy the code AddThis provides for later use.

Now, there are two options:

1. If you only want your visitors to submit and share your blog as a whole, then installing the button is very easy.

Sign in to your Blogger Dashboard -> Layout -> Page Elements -> Add a Gadget -> HTML/JavaScript and paste the code you copied at AddThis in the Content section. Preview, the Save the changes.

2. Otherwise, a little more work is required.

a) Open your Blogger Dashboard,  choose the blog you want to add the button to, then click on Layout --> Edit HTML.

b) Now save a copy of your code by hitting Download Full Template (You´ll need this in case anything should go wrong and you have to restore your original settings).

c) Check the box Expand Widget Templates.

d) Look for the code line <div class='post-footer'>

e) Insert the Addthis code immediately after the above code line.

f) DO NOT SAVE YET!!

g) Hit the Preview button to see if the button appears at the bottom of your blog posts.

h) If you are satisfied with the way things look, click Save Template.

i) If you do not like it, simply click Clear Edits to return your code to its original state.

P.S.: Alternatively, you can insert the code for the Addthis button directly above the code line < data: post.body/> .

 

Technorati-Tags: addthis button,addthis,add widget,share content,bookmark