Share Posts, From Private Blogs, By Email

Owners of private blogs have, periodically, lamented the lack of options for distribution of comments and posts. We've seen a few queries, in Blogger Help Forum: Learn More About Blogger.

How do I let my readers subscribe to my private blog?

There's no good answer, to please everybody, here.

You can't use EMail, FeedBurner, or Reading List, for sharing private blog content. FeedBurner requires the blog comments / posts newsfeeds - and private blogs don't produce newsfeeds.

If you need to distribute content from a private blog, you'll have to use BlogSend.

Private blog post subscriptions require the dashboard "BlogSend" feature.

You'll have to use "BlogSend" to provide email subscriptions, for private blogs - and that limits you to 10 subscribers (1 who should be you). That's the "Email posts to" option in the dashboard Settings - Email page.

"BlogSend" aka "Email posts to" is the only option, for private blogs.



You can try to email specific posts, from a private blog.

You can try to use the Blogger post footer "Email Posts" feature.

Just enable the "Email Post Links" option in "Configure Blog Posts". You cannot enable "Show Share Buttons" - but you can enable "Show Email Post Links".

Use "Configure Blog Posts" from the dashboard Layout page.

Look under "Post Page Options" for "Show Email Post Links".



With the option enabled, and the icon visible, it's still a no go.

D'Ohh!



There's still no social sharing of private blog content.

Note the advice for "Show Share Buttons".

Sharing is available only for public blogs.

You can't share blog content, outside Blogger, if the blog is private. That protects private blog owners, from having their confidential posts distributed to the world.

We can't share content from private blogs, using EMail, FaceBook, Google+, Pinterest, or Twitter.

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If you publish a private #Blogger blog, you cannot email or share comments or posts. Your only option will be BlogSend aka the "Email posts to" dashboard option.

Confusion About GMail Vs Non GMail Based Email

Long ago, when diagnosing a problem thought to involve email, in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue, we would ask a very simple question

Is your Blogger account based on a GMail - or non GMail - email address?

And we would carefully add

Please, do not state your email address, here!

The latter request was to prevent theft of peoples Blogger accounts.

Now, in many cases, we must qualify the question of email address. We also ask.

Is your email provided by your employer, ISP, or school network?

and even

Do you read your email in a browser window, or a local email client?

Modern email distribution is not always homogeneous.

Both questions reflect the complex nature of email delivery, that is a part of Internet reality.

Few people can accurately diagnose their problems, based only on the simple question

Is your Blogger account based on a GMail - or non GMail - email address?

The lines between GMail, and non GMail email accounts - and addresses - are not absolute, any more.

Both GMail and non GMail addresses may be used in a local network.

GMail, and non GMail addresses, alike, may use GMail browser based email, in delivery and display. And GMail accounts may use non GMail email systems, for addressing, delivery, and / or display.

These variations can lead to interesting scenarios such as mysterious loss of blog membership invitations, and of email subscriptions. And options for Blogger account recovery become more complicated - with password synchronisation issues, between the email account and the Blogger account.

Thanks to Google Apps based domains, and the ability to provide non GMail addresses which use GMail, anybody can use a non GMail address with GMail based delivery and display. Some people have even setup Blogger accounts, based on Google Apps based email addresses (again, appearing to be non GMail based) - though this is not recommended.

Managed domains may use GMail delivery, and a non GMail email address.

Corporate email systems, ISP provided email, and schools (of all grades, elementary through university) may use Google Apps based email. Many large local network based email systems have been "upgraded" to use cloud based email, such as GMail, for delivery and display. The results are not always beneficial.

And, thanks to "push / pull" GMail options, where an individual GMail account can be configured by a knowlegeable account owner, even individual account owners can use a GMail address, with non GMail delivery and display - or can use GMail display, for non GMail based address / delivery.

With computer owners who do not care or know about what email system they use, with where the individual messages may be filed, and with security filters that update without notice, loss of email messages is common.

Bounced email does not get dropped into the "Bulk" / "Spam" folder.

Note that "bounced" email may not be treated as spam. Some "bounced" email never gets as far as a spam filter - it may simply be rejected. You will look, in vain, in the "Bulk", "Inbox", and "Spam" folders.

This will interfere with account recovery - if you can't find the password reset email, how do you recover control of the account?

The simple question

Is your Blogger account based on a GMail - or non GMail - email address?

just is not accurate, when diagnosing all Blogger problems.

Setup An Audit Trail For Your Team Blog

Ever since Blogger gave us the ability to have team blogs, blog owners have been asking

How do I track what my authors are posting?

as if Blogger blogs have an audit trail option. The unfortunate truth is that Blogger is a website publishing platform - it is (or was, at one time) called

Blogger One Button Publishing

Blogger, quite simply, is not a Content Management System.

However, even if Blogger does not provide a packaged audit trail, which would be a standard feature in any CMS, this does not mean that we cannot set one up, with very little work. If you publish a team blog (or a single owner blog), you already have this option.

The display medium, for a Blogger blog audit trail, is quite simple - your email Inbox. Both Comments and Posts, when published, can post to your Inbox. How to generate the audit trail depends upon whether the blog is public, or private.

Any blog, public or private, can provide an audit trail using email from comments (aka "Comment Notification"), and from posts (aka "BlogSend").

A public blog, which publishes a blog feed, can alternately provide an audit trail using FeedBurner email distribution. Formatting options for FeedBurner email distribution are much more flexible.

Whether your audit trail starts from BlogSend / Comment Notification, or FeedBurner email, just setup a few email filters, and store all Blogger audit trail email in a properly named folder. And there's your audit trail.

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Private Blog Owners Need To Use Google+, To Distribute Blog Updates

Recently, we've seen a few questions in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken, about email distribution of blog posts, from private blogs.

I previously used a Google Group, to send an email to more than 102 people. This is now no longer working - my Google Group is not notified of a new post, automatically. Any idea what could have changed or be going wrong?

Here, we see signs of the use of Google+ becoming more necessary.

Some months ago, Blogger, responding to a security vulnerability in BlogSend, changed the email address used by BlogSend. This required many owners of private blogs, using Google Groups to distribute BlogSend based email updates, to add "noreply@blogger.com" as a Group member. This requires the use of the Groups administrative control, to add a new member without consent.

The ability to add a new member, without consent (without requiring return confirmation from the new member), carried with it a warning, to Groups administrators.

If you misuse this option, your use of it may be revoked.

This ability, when provided, was an excellent tool for spammers, to maintain a spam victim mailing list.

Recently, and possibly involving the misuse of "noreply@blogger.com" as Groups members, the option to add Groups members without consent was removed from the Groups "invite members" wizard. Now, any new Groups memberships require return consent from the new member.

This change leaves owners of private Groups unable to add "noreply@blogger.com" as a Group member - which leaves Groups unusable for distribution of private blog content. Private blog owners now have only one option - Use Google+, and properly restricted Circles, to selectively distribute blog post updates.

Note that owners of publicly accessible blogs can use Google+ also, in addition to the also popular option to use FeedBurner Email Distribution. Or, if you want to continue using Groups for distribution, set "Who can post messages?" to "Anyone can post", in the "Group settings" Access tab.

Google+ will also be useful as a replacement for Private blogs, where membership has grown past the 100 member limit. This will, unfortunately, require that each member setup a Google+ account - and become less anonymous. One feature of Google+, which not every blog owner or member appreciates, is the loss of anonymity. Google+ accounts are based on our actual legal identity, by Google policy. Not everybody wants to be identifiable.

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Security Change To BlogSend Leaves BlogSend Email Distribution Broken #2

A year ago, we noted a security change to BlogSend, which left many blog owners with severely deprecated ability to publicise blog updates, when using a private Google Group. At that time, the recommended workaround was to add "no-reply@blogger.com" as a Google Group member.

Today, we see that the ability to add Google Group members directly is no longer offered. It appears now that the use of private Google Groups, for distribution of Blogger blog updates, is not an option.

Last week, Blogger announced the option to publicise blog updates using Google+.

It would appear that use of Google+ may be the future, for Blogger blog publicity. Some time ago, we were advised that private Blogger profiles were being replaced by Google+. It's possible that private blog updates may have the same future.

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Publicising Updates To Your Blog, Using Google+

Ever since Google+ was released, blog owners have been asking how to post blog updates to Google+. Previously, there was only the possibility of publishing from Google+ to our blogs - and that option was not well designed. Last week, Blogger released this option, in Draft Blogger.

Today we’re excited to announce the first way you will be able to leverage Google+ -- by making it possible to replace your Blogger profile with your Google+ profile.

In addition to giving your readers a more robust and familiar sense of who you are, your social connections will see your posts in their Google search results with an annotation that you've shared the post.

As long as you are prepared to use a Google+ profile with your Blogger account, you can send blog updates to your followers.

After you login to Blogger, simply edit your profile. There, you'll see the advice

Connect Blogger to Google+ : Use your Google profile and get access to upcoming Google+ features on Blogger. Learn more Get Started

After you upgrade Blogger to use your Google+ profile, go to the dashboard Settings - Google+, and select "Prompt to share after posting", for automatic sharing. Or, you can use the Posts link "Share" for any post, when convenient.

I suspect there will be several possibilities with this new feature, so watch this space for updates.