friends wanted nothing to do with our TwitterTwitter reviews
updates. Now that Twitter is growing at an astounding rate and rounding the mainstream bend, more of our Facebook friends have developed a fancy for Twitter themselves, and it’s becoming commonplace to highlight our tweets on our Facebook walls. If you’re new to Twitter, or just haven’t followed the Twitter to Facebook trend in recent months, we’ve found a few quick and easy ways to turn your tweets into status updates. From auto-updating your Facebook status, to more calculated updates, we think these five ways to share Twitter updates with Facebook will satisfy those of us with a predilection for maintaining dual social presences.
1. Auto-Update with a Facebook Application
If you’re looking to automatically post your Twitter updates straight to Facebook, the Twitter application (by Twitter) is your best bet. It’s pretty darn simple to use as well: just install the application and then click to allow Twitter to update your Facebook status. The Tweeterapp is of the same variety and includes a few additional features related to viewing and engaging with tweets while using Facebook, though there are some known issues.
Those of us who are loquacious Twitterers might opt instead for the Selective Twitter Status application, which will only update your wall with tweets that include the #fb hashtag. TweetSync provides a similar function, though it’s keyword based, and also includes an option to sync all your tweets unless a particular keyword is included in a tweet.
Facebook Page admins have a few additional options. One such option is Involver, which is actually a suite of Facebook applications for Pages. The Twitter for Pages app essentially just adds a Twitter tab with a collection of tweets to a Facebook Page. It’s a nice alternative for brands and companies who want to showcase their Twitter presence without over-updating their Page’s wall with an influx of tweets.
2. Use a Twitter Client
We’re starting to see more and more Twitter apps moonlight as Facebook-friendly apps, due in part to the recent launch of Facebook’s Open Stream API.
Two such applications are TweetDeckTweetDeck reviews, a desktop client (rivaling Seesmic Desktop), and PeopleBrowsr, a multi-purpose web-based application. Both applications have integrated Facebook features and simply require selecting an additional checkbox to send tweets to Facebook (or vice versa). There’s also Tweet3 for web-based multiple account support, link tracking, and posting to Facebook.
BlackBerry owners can turn to SocialScope, currently in private beta, for simultaneously updating Twitter and Facebook while on the run. When it comes to the iPhone, users can purchase the pricey Tweetion (which didn’t fare so well in our 29 Twitter Apps for the iPhone Compared post) to turn Facebook status updates on and off per tweet.
3. Via Facebook Connect
Facebook Connect offers site developers and website owners an immediate way to let new users log in to their sites using their Facebook accounts. We’ve seen 10 really great implementations, but Twitterers will love how Tweetpo.st takes advantage of Facebook Connect for a variety of Twitter to Facebook goodness.
Tweetpo.st is a doozy of an application for the obsessive Twitterer with an affinity for more meaningful Facebook updates. Once you connect Tweetpo.st with Facebook, you can do the obvious and post your tweets as status updates, but also selectively update, include rich-media links on your wall, convert Twitter names in @replies to real names, and track link performance using awe.sm. Awesome.
4. Just Speak It
There are times when we’d really like to phone in our Twitter and Facebook updates with little to no effort. Vlingo’s mobile application for Nokia, BlackBerry, and iPhone does speech recognition for a variety of functions, but we love it for status updates.
Once your Facebook and Twitter accounts are configured, you can hit the “press + speak” button and say the “status update” command to start verbalizing your update. Vlingo will then transcribe your audio to text and update your status on Facebook and Twitter. We also really like the fact that you can double check the speech to text translation before you update your social presence.
5. Ping Your Page or Profile
Sometimes you want your status update to hit all of your social profiles, not just Twitter and Facebook. So, for mass distribution of your status updates, you can either turn to HelloTxt or Ping.fmPing.Fm reviews.
You can use Ping.fm and HootSuite together to disseminate your tweets everywhere. Plus, there’s also a convenient way for admins to link their Facebook Pages with Ping.fm to seamlessly post updates. HelloTxt works in a similar fashion to Ping.fm and provides a simple way for a single to many status update, and also supports the ability to auto-update Facebook Pages.
The great thing about these services is that they’re starting to get integrated with more and more Twitter applications and desktop clients, so you can have the option to ping Facebook and the rest during the course of your normal Twittering activities.
