Web Site Promotion

One feature that is valuable in getting the word out is making it easy for people to subscribe to RSS feeds. When I speak of RSS I mean RSS or Atom feeds. Read about RSS - probably more than you want to know.

Blogs and many web sites use RSS feeds to communicate new information, such as press releases, new software, and upgrades available. It should be as easy as clicking on your favorite RSS reader logo (or if it is not listed click on the universal RSS icon and paste it into your reader) and go. I try and list the most common readers without getting out of hand.

A help page on feeds is a necessity since many people still do not know what feeds are or know enough about feeds to feel comfortable subscribing to them.

If you are a user of WordPress for your blogging, one of our favorite syndication plug-ins is subscribe me. Once activated there are many choices of syndication buttons to choose. They show up on the sidebar under a ‘Syndication’ heading.
For particular sites containing RSS readers such as Bloglines, Google Reader or Newsgator have buttons that can be added to your blog or website so users can subscribe to your feed. Note that most personalized home pages such as MSN, Google, or Yahoo have ways of adding RSS feeds to them.

Here are some examples of how an RSS feed button can be added to your blog/website. Click on ‘Add’ and it will take you to the appropriate site so you can create your own syndication code then cut-and-paste into your blog or website area.

• Add to Google
• Add to Yahoo!

Services such as FeedBurner, Squeet, or FeedBlitz can handle syndication for you. Some blog software, such as WordPress, have plug-ins to reroute your feed to FeedBurner where the subscriber then chooses which reader to use. A nice side effect is you can monitor your subscriber base.

If you choose to add feed subscription yourself you can add the universal RSS feed button or a text-only link which is directed to FeedBurner. When a subscriber clicks on it, FeedBurner takes over and offers various subscription buttons.

Doug

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 10th, 2007 at 12:59 pm and is filed under Blogging, RSS, Syndication. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.