HootSuite’s Secret Weapon: The Hootlet
July 19/2012 UPDATE: This is old news! Check out the latest developments with Hootlet here.
We call the Hootlet our secret weapon because it has the power to completely change how you use Twitter. Want to share a link? No need to leave the page. Hit the Hootlet button, and your tweet is almost done. Automatically, the URL is shortened and text is grabbed from the site’s <title> tag. It’s that easy!
So what is the Hootlet like in action? Let’s take a peek.
Installation
It can’t get any simpler than this. To install the Hootlet, you drag and drop it into the bookmark bar. Still confused? Don’t worry, we got this nifty YouTube tutorial.
Using the Hootlet
The Hootlet takes simplicity to insane heights. What must you do to use it? Press the Hootlet button in the bookmark bar.
Once you do that, a new window pops up. Your URL has been shrunk with our ow.ly URL shortener, and the tweet is ready to go. But what makes the Hootlet more amazing is the ability to schedule!
What’s HootSuite if you can’t manage multiple accounts? You can do that from the Hootlet too. Click on the profiles you want to use for tweeting, and a checkmark confirms what accounts will send the message.
How Can the Hootlet Help?
The Hootlet saves time. With it, you no longer have to manually shorten a URL — an ow.ly link is provided automatically. Headlines are grabbed from the source’s <title> tag and are used as default text. Best of all, you never have to leave a site to tweet about. This is why the Hootlet is our secret weapon — and will be yours too.
I would use the Hootlet, but for some reason it resizes my Firefox window and makes it impossible to use.
I like Hootlet but one annoying thing happens. My browser window is automatically re-sized to a fraction and I have to enlarge it every time to get it back to the correct size. Don’t know why this happens.
Firefox 3.0.10 on Mac OS X
Uhhmmm…A-M-A-Z-I-N-G!!!
I love the lil hootlet.make twitter life even easier. Way to go hootsuite team! =D
You guys are missing the boat here. I don’t want the title of the page in the edit box. I want the text I have selected in the page. So I can edit and save myself alot of retyping. I got spoiled by BigTweet . . which I will continue to use until HootSuite gets up to speed.
Thank you for reading.
Great tool the Hootlet – I love it. But it is useless when ow.ly is down and it is down again… Maybe you can implement an other URL shrinkener?
I love this.
A couple of suggestions:
Along similar experiences as Norm above, I’d like Hootlet to open in a new window so that I can look at the original page while twitting. Also, as I send my tweet, I’d like to be able to decide where I want to go from there: 1. close window 2. dashboard
Thanks!
I cannot drag-and-drop the Hootlet onto the IE7…anywhere. I had no problem adding it to Safari. What am I doing wrong…your video shows Safari even though most of the known world uses IE.
Hi, nice posts there :-) thank’s for the interesting information
hi , its really nice post …….. thanks for sharing such nice information
Awesome and thank you so much for creating a great product. It will make it a lot more easier to share my findings with my peeps, eh? Will do an article on my blog to spread the news!
Sweet Dreams,
Sweet
I do love the Hootlet, but I have one request …
It would be GREAT if this could integrate with my delicious account. So I could tweet and tag/bookmark an item in one easy step.
I completely agree, the more integration into these other places save so much time and would make me continue to use HootSuite as my Twitter app of choice.
@Thomas P. Leisle Jr. See this post: http://getsatisfaction.com/hootsuite/topics/can_not_drag_hootlet_to_ie8_tool_bar
We also have a new “how to” video that makes this clearer! IE instructions are about 30 seconds into the video on this blog post.
@Norm Gregory@Justin Rasmussen Those are both things we’re thinking about.
@Simon Sharwood
You can check your firefox option to let the Hootlet open in a pop up or right click on it and from the proprieties make it open in sidebar instead :) hope that helps
I use IE8
I don’t see in mt favourites a links option, so I also don’t see a toolbar for bookmarking, other than the one which is provided by delicious.
Please advise, because the hootie makes all the difference and without I simply could stick to twitter.
@Thomas P. Leisle Jr.
right click — (1) add it to your favorites (2) place inside the default “Links” folder (3) make certain links toolbar is showing.
Amazing Twitter tool!
I love Hootsuite! Is there a version for the iphone?
This hootlet is hoot! when is the desktop version coming? i mainly use Seesmic Desktop to manage my twitter accounts. The only thing missing is this feature where I don’t have to manually copy the URL to trims it.
I totally agree. Integrate HootSuite and Delicious and you’ll have me at “hoot”. @Justin Rasmussen
The Hootlet refuses to drag to my browser toolbar, either on IE7 or Google Chrome. What’s up w/ that HootSuite?
Where did the Hootlet Owl go so I can install this? The home page changed and I can’t find the Owl.
I WOULD install it…if I could find it. It’s not on your homepage anymore and I can’t seem to locate it anywhere. Makes it rather difficult to use. There’s no link in the article either. What were you thinking!? Promote, promote, promote!
@Steve @helenapoll — We had to temporarily put up a notice about the DDoS issues Twitter had been having. We’ve taken this down, so you should be able to see the Hootlet. Happy tweeting!
@Debibliophile — In IE or Chrome, you may need to right-click on the hootlet and save it to your favorites.
Know when you will be offering the functionality of including photos and video?
my hootsuite 2.0 reverted back to old hootsuite but with a few better features. Is anyone else having this issue?
I was digging through all my twitter accounts and wishing there was a way to keep them organized when I stumbled upon hootsuite and I thought wow this is Delicious. I sent the link to a friend via email and asked him if he reditt. He called me while I was eating lunch at Mr. Wongs and gave me props for the good find. Now hootsuite is both our faves. Great work and thanks!
me,too
Why did you turn the Hootlet into an add-on?! I want the simple version back so it integrates with my Bookmark toolbar in Firefox!
Hootlet works great in my Firefox … but when I recommended Hootsuite and the Hootlet to a friend with MSIE 8, she couldn’t get Hootlet to work. I tried it, and she’s right. It will not drag to my MSIE (8) bar for love nor money. It acts like it’s going to … but it doesn’t ever take. :(
Love hootlet, but it would be great if I could use it on my iPhone and from google reader app
Homepage is not showing hootlet again???? I see the video tutorial, but cannot find the owl to drag to my toolbar… HELP!!
Hootlet no longer working. Used it for months, no problem, didn’t change anything, but suddenly stopped working. Allows me to enter all the info fine, but then it doesn’t register in HootSuite.
Hello Linda,
Are you using a bookmark or a browser (Chrome) extension?
Do you guys support hootlet for Safari? I can’t seem to find the bookmark for it
Simply drag and drop the Hootlet into your Safari bookmark bar and you are good to go.
Exactly what i wanted to know Dave, tnx.
Cannot add to my IE 9 toolbar because my Hootsuite page does not have the same drop down list as shown in video!
Hi Ann,
Contact our Help Desk for assistance with this.
Not seeing anything different at Help Desk. I don’t have an Apps and Plugin listing in my drop-down menu. The only place the Hootlet shows up is under tools, and the screen won’t display the entire Hootlet box.
In hootlet, how do i control the info that is automatically posted? Say i dont want the browser im using posted in the hoot, how do i control this?
thanks!
Hi tadpole207,
I think you’re referring to a known issue with using the Hootlet for Firefox that pulls in the browser name. We’ve escalated this to our development team and hope to have a fix out in the future. Hope this is helpful.
How to install hootlet in ie10. Does not work with option under tools to drag and drop. Works fine in Firefox. Possible to send me a download link like in Firefox? Many thanks, Janneke