Blogger, the free publishing tool from Google, is still going strong, and that’s quite impressive given that it’s ten years old and facing potential challengers like Facebook and Twitter.  So at SXSW, a product manager over Blogger explained how the tool has kept up with the times.

As Siobhan Quinn, the product manager in question, noted, a “share to” feature that lets people inform their Facebook and Twitter contacts of new blog posts is one thing that’s proven handy.  Sending links has allowed bloggers to reinforce connections regardless of differences between networks.

There’s not necessarily a competition taking place, either.  Quinn pointed out that blogging is “definitely a different type of media from status updates . . . but it’s very complementary at the same time.”

The Blogger team has tried to give it some advantages, though, and one edge relates to the amount of control blogs offer users.  The recent introduction of the Blogger Template Designer is a good example of this.  Quinn said, “We really wanted to empower our users to express themselves not only through their words, but through how they present themselves in their blog, as well.”

To that end, the new template designer allows users to separate attributes so that they can choose designs, layouts, background images, and colors independently of each other.  Yet at the same time, there are user-friendly shortcuts, like the option to shift all colors at once.

As for the future of Blogger, more advances are on the way.  Look for further upgrades related to presentation, and monetization opportunities will also play a key role.