RSS Feeds and How to Use Them

RSS feeds are the most important technology to arrive on the internet since blogging, yet take up of RSS feeds among webmasters and web visitors is still very low. The Sunday Times recent ran a survey to see how home users use the internet, RSS did not appear in it at all.

It's true that RSS is nowhere near as ubiquitous as email, but email have been around since the beginning of the internet. RSS and RSS feeds are relatively new to internet users. If you are a webmaster you can benefit from this new technology that will allow you to speak directly to your visitors and keep them updated with what you are up to. You can get up to speed with RSS feeds at http://www.newsniche.com.

According to Feedster, one of the largest RSS feed search engines, there are over 9 million feeds in its index. RSS feeds are a technology to be taken seriously, you can ignore it now but you will find yourself way behind other webmasters when it comes to the benefits of having your own feed.

To put RSS in context take a look at Bloglines, probably the largest feed aggregator on the internet. When you subscribe to a feed using Bloglines they tell you how many other of their readers are subscribed to the same feed. Slashdot there more subscribed to feed besides their own has about 35,000 subscribers to their RSS feed. Remember that's just other Bloglines users so it only reflects a small percentage of their total readers.

Let me take you through some of the benefits of having your own RSS feed. If you take the example I just used for readers of the Slashdot feed. Every time a new item is published to the RSS feed it is available to every single subscriber immediately. You are guaranteed that every reader will get the message whether they choose to read it or not. If you done this with email you would be lucky if a majority of your readers even received the message due to spam filters and other obstacles.

Unlike email an RSS feed is zero maintenance. There is no list of addresses to maintain, no server needed to send out your messages, all you are doing is updating a file on your server. There is no need to worry about being accused of spamming, double opt in or adding to the spam problem.

I have left the best till last. You can even have detailed statistics about your RSS feed by using a third party such as Feedburner, all free. Feedburner will monitor the requests made for your feed so you know how many readers you have and even tell you which items have been clicked on. Plus Feedburner saves you your valuable bandwidth and takes away any worries about the compatibility of your RSS feed.

I have been publishing an RSS feed for several months, it has worked so well that I have decided that I do not need the hassle of an email newsletter. The only time I use email now is if I want a personal conversation with someone, that's what email is great at.

Allan is the webmaster at http://www.newsniche.com an RSS resource for webmasters. Learn how to use RSS to attract and retain visitors to your site.

---

Building Backlinks With Blogs

The most boring part of getting traffic to a website... Read More

Using Feedburner to Add Statistics to Your RSS Feed

Out of many of the free RSS and blogging services... Read More

Article Marketing For Bloggers - 4 Tips To Build Traffic For Your Blog

Bloggers blog. That's what they do. A blog is short... Read More

Blogging for Personal Benefits

While there is a lot of debate about blogs replacing... Read More

RSS: This Publishers Choice

RSS is the interactive communication tool being popularized by bloggers.... Read More

Why Would You Use Blogs Instead of a Web Site For Your Online Business?

Why would you use Blogs instead of a web site... Read More

The Real Bloggers Must Come From Another Planet - I Can?t Find Any Here On Earth

What in the world is up with the world of... Read More

To Blog Or Not To Blog - A Laymans View

We have now entered the world of blogs! Sounds kind... Read More

Starting Your Own Blog

I was sitting in my local Internet Cafe yesterday, I... Read More

The Right Blog Software Can Make A Blog Stand Out from the Crowd

Blogs are an easy way to get your voice out... Read More

RSS Can Keep You In The Loop

When webmasters first hear about RSS they tend to concentrate... Read More

Why you should be using RSS

RSS opens up a whole new channel of communication between... Read More

It Really Is Simple RSS

I have 'Googlebot' coming to my site every day since... Read More

Profit Pulling Niche Blogs with Wordpress

When it comes to building and creating profit pulling niche... Read More

Just Tag It!

Tags - Revolutionary or Just Folly?Just another trend or something... Read More

RSS For Fresh Content & Better Ranking

A lot of commotion was made some time ago when... Read More

Should My Home Business Have a Blog?

It's fair to say that blogging has taken the Internet... Read More

Marketing With Blogs - Part 2

In part 1 of this article series on marketing with... Read More

Make Money with Your Own Blog

Well, basically, setting up a blog means that you are... Read More

Displaying RSS Feeds on Websites

Displaying RSS RSS offers webmasters a unique opportunity to display... Read More

RSS Latest News - Blogging or Blagging?

The RSS latest news suggests that RSS can stand for... Read More

RSS Directory Submission: The Key to Blog Promotion

According to Technorati, there are over 15 million blogs as... Read More

Small / Medium Business Blog Process Outsourcing as a Website Traffic Building Service

You are a small or a medium business owner. You... Read More

RSS for Bloggers

While syndication has many applications, we will deal specifically with... Read More

Using RSS Feeds to Set Off a Traffic Explosion

RSS, or Really Simple Syndication, is the perfect answer to... Read More

What Consumers Need To Know About RSS Feeds

Feeds are simple, really. What's even more exciting is that... Read More

How To Create A Blog

Blogs are more permanent than posts to an online discussion... Read More

RSS Works: Hard Metrics to Prove It

Marketers are constantly asking if RSS marketing works and if... Read More

An Appeal To The Bloggers!

Blogging is smart an art. Blog sites are the nicest... Read More

RSS Feeds Future Revealed

I don't claim to be a futurologist or an RSS... Read More

How Can You Use Blogs To Increase Traffic?

I am conducting my 1st customer appreciation webcast and asked... Read More

Business Blogging - 5 Tips to Help You Smashl Through Writers Block

It's inevitable. Everyone hits the wall. Whether you've been blogging... Read More

How Weblogs can Help Realtors

What is a weblog, well simply put a weblog is... Read More