Posted 3/19/08 - Kellex

Utilizing Digg can be one of your greatest assets when promoting your sports blog. If a story makes the main page you could see thousands of page views within a matter of hours. Not only does this drive a ton of traffic, but it puts you into an elite category of Digg that will help drive continuous traffic to your blog for weeks and possibly months. Once you have submitted a front page worthy story, the chances of that happening again are likely. You see, Digg is dominated by a small percentage of its users; not just anyone can have 3000 Digg’s on a post.

To get you started with Digg, you need to have Digg buttons included with your blog posts. This is not necessary but it adds to your look and lets people know that you use Digg and have the option to Digg your story if they’d like. It’s better to have the option than not at all right?


Here are the steps:

The first step is to log into your Blogger account dashboard and click on “Layout.”

Under “Layout”, click the “Edit HTML” tab. Block copy the entire HTML code for your site and save it in a text file. You can also click the "Download Template" link. This is one of the two necessary steps whenever you want to change the template. The second step is of course to “Preview” the new changes, and save the changes only when you are satisfied. The backup you have saved in a text file will come in handy when you accidentally click to save the changes without previewing them. With a backup, you can easily restore the template to the prior state if need be.

Click the box next to “Expand Widget Templates”. Scroll about two-thirds down the template to look for the code that reads:-

<p><data:post.body/></p>

(You could also CTRL+F = post.body)

To have the Digg button appear at the top of the body of your post you can insert the code above this code:

<div style='float:right; margin-left:10px;'>
<script type='text/javascript'>
digg_url="<data:post.url/>";
</script>
<script src='http://digg.com/tools/diggthis.js'type='text/javascript'/>
</div>
<p><data:post.body/></p>

By using the ‘float:right’ code you are telling the button to appear at the top right of your post. If you would like it on the left, simply replace ‘right’ with ‘left’.

If you would like to position the Digg button at the bottom of your post, you just drop the Digg code under ‘the post.body’ code. Like This:

<p><data:post.body/></p>
<div style='float:right; margin-left:10px;'>
<script type='text/javascript'>
digg_url="<data:post.url/>";
</script>
<script src='http://digg.com/tools/diggthis.js' type='text/javascript'/>
</div>

If the big Digg button is driving you nuts, you can change the format to Digg’s compact style. Here is the code to use to make it a compact button:

<div style='float:right; margin-left:10px;'>
<script type='text/javascript'>
digg_url="<data:post.url/>";
digg_skin="compact";
</script>
<script src='http://digg.com/tools/diggthis.js' type='text/javascript'/>
</div>

You can place this code above or below the post.body tags as well.

If you don’t like the color, that can be changed also! The code looks like this:

<div style='float:right; margin-left:10px;'>
<script type='text/javascript'>
digg_url="<data:post.url/>";
digg_bgcolor="#BDEDFF";
digg_skin="compact";
</script>
<script src='http://digg.com/tools/diggthis.js' type='text/javascript'/>
</div>
<p><data:post.body/></p>

Play around with it, it is pretty damn simple to do. Once this button is in your code, it will show up for every post and you do not need to repeat these steps again. Good luck!