WordPress
Share articles to your channels from the WordPress editor, or automatically when they're published.
The Orbitwrite for WordPress plugin puts the composer inside WordPress. Write the social post for an article and publish it now, schedule it, or queue it for your workspace's next free slot. Each person on your site connects their own Orbitwrite account, so there's no API key to share.
Before you start
Your site needs:
- A public address over HTTPS, since Orbitwrite connects to your site to finish signing you in.
- Permalinks set to anything other than Plain, under Settings → Permalinks in WordPress.
- WordPress 6.6 or later, and PHP 7.4 or later.
The plugin checks each of these on its Orbitwrite page and tells you which one to change. You also need an Orbitwrite workspace with at least one connected channel.
Install and connect
In WordPress, open Plugins → Add New Plugin and search for Orbitwrite. Install it and activate it.
Open Orbitwrite in the admin menu and choose Connect Orbitwrite.
Sign in on orbitwrite.com and approve the connection. You're sent back to WordPress with your channels listed.
The plugin posts to the workspace you picked when you signed in, and the composer names it ("Posting to Acme").
Share an article
In the block editor, open the Share on Orbitwrite sidebar from the share icon in the toolbar. It starts the post from the article's title and link, and attaches its featured image.
- Main post: the text and image every channel uses by default.
- Channels: tick the channels to post to. Untick Same as main post under a channel to give it its own text or image. Each channel shows its character count and flags anything its network won't accept, such as an Instagram post with no image.
- When: Next slot uses your workspace's posting schedule, Pick a time takes a date and time, and Now publishes straight away. Times are in your workspace's timezone, and the sidebar names it.
Images go to each network at the largest size it accepts, picked from the sizes WordPress already generated. A post you haven't sent is kept if you close the sidebar or reload the page; Start over from the article resets it.
On a site using the Classic Editor, the same controls appear in a Share on Orbitwrite box on the edit screen.
After it's sent
The sidebar lists every post sent for the article, with its status (scheduled, awaiting approval or published) and a link to each live post. Published posts show their impressions, reactions, comments, reposts and link clicks. A post that hasn't gone out yet can be deleted from there.
The Posts list gets a Social column showing which articles have been shared, and a Share link on each row.
Auto-share
Under Orbitwrite → Auto-share, turn on Share my articles when they're published and choose:
- Channels: where each new article goes.
- Text: the post, written with template tags that are filled in from the article.
- Attach the featured image: on by default.
- When: the next free slot, or as soon as the article is published.
- Share these: posts, pages, or both.
| Tag | Filled in with |
|---|---|
{title} | The article's title |
{url} | Its link |
{excerpt} | Its excerpt, or the start of the article |
{author} | The author's name |
{hashtags} | Its tags, as hashtags |
The preview fills the text in from your latest article, so you can check it before saving.
An article is auto-shared once, the first time it's published, and never if it was already shared from its sidebar. To leave one article out, turn auto-share off in its Share on Orbitwrite sidebar before publishing.
Auto-share settings belong to each author. When an editor publishes someone else's article, it goes to the author's channels with the author's settings.
Results
The Orbitwrite page in the admin menu, and a widget on the WordPress dashboard, compare your last four weeks with the four before: posts published, impressions, engagements and link clicks, plus your top posts. The page also has a composer for posts that aren't about an article. For the full picture, open Analytics in Orbitwrite.
Approvals and permissions
The plugin acts as you, with your role in the workspace. If your role needs approval to publish, a post from WordPress waits for a reviewer, and the sidebar shows it as awaiting approval.
Disconnect
Choose Disconnect on the plugin's Orbitwrite page, or remove the WordPress connection under Settings → MCP → Connected apps in Orbitwrite. Either one cuts the plugin off straight away.