Xcerpt for Twitter
Download from Google Play
Price: Free
Do you tweet from your smartphone or tablet? If yes, you probably have these daily struggles that the mobile platform still imposes on tweeting. Besides those, the 140 characters limit is one of the most nagging issues with Twitter, and if you enjoy reading posts that are longer, you know how it’s done – by posting a screenshot of the text and a caption or a comment to it. That can fit into 140 characters and contain that pitch you would like your audience to read and follow the link. Or simply tap that new “heart” icon that’s there instead of the favorite.
What it does
Xcerpt is a tiny and nifty app that helps you create good looking images containing the text you want to share on Twitter. The app works with the contents of your Clipboard, so you can just copy the text from anywhere on the web. It also works directly with your screenshots and lets you crop them. The app is dead simple in usage.
Clipboard
Find the text you want to paste into the image, and copy it. Then go to Xcerpt and choose the option “Paste Text.” You will see your pasted text in the bottom window. The multicolored bulbs at the top let you set the border color for your image. The last thing to do is add the source and see how neat it translates into the snippet at the bottom of the image. If you like, you can then squeeze your comment in the 140 characters allowed by Twitter and hit “Post to Twitter.”
Screenshots
With screenshots, it’s pretty much the same – the difference is that you will need to crop the image. It gets a little getting used to doing the copying work, but it’s really fast and in the end the outcome looks fabulous in your Twitter timeline. Besides, the app should fetch the URL of your source automatically, and let you choose it from the list of the recently used ones.
More color selection would be awesome, not everyone is a fan of the Material Design. Perhaps it would be too much to ask for a color selection tool and an overlay screen capture button in some future update.
The app is free, and contains no IAPs whatsoever. The app posts the images to your Twitter timeline, so mind that you will be granting the app the permission to access your Twitter account. You can also save the images in your Xcerpt library.
Features include:
- highlighting the part of the text you consider most important (an eye-catcher inside an eye-catcher)
- pick the background color
- the source selection is automatically
- the app posts your image tweet on your timeline
It’s lightweight, easy to use, and does its job of creating elegant screenshots and text snippets. This way, your articles will have better chances of catching the attention of your target audience. If you can’t pitch them with a short title, then pitch them with an excerpt that is catchy. That’s about it. Go win those followers!
