Many internet marketers are slow to recognize the importance of RSS feeds and the potential it has for delivering targeted and ‘wanted‘ traffic to their sites. Just like a traditional newsletter, subscribers must opt-in to get the feed. Once subscribed to the RSS Feed, they’ll automatically be updated as you add new content to your site. A lot of visitors, especially Bloggers, see feeds as a very practical and convenient way to stay informed and keep track of their favorite sites.

What is RSS?

RSS is the acronym for ‘Really Simple Syndication‘ and it’s basically the standard of syndication for websites to use to syndicate their content. A RSS feed generally needs a reader or aggregator to see it.

The subscriber’s point of view

Why would someone want to subscribe to a feed when they need a special reader to see it? First, if a site visitor really likes your site and doesn’t want to miss what’s coming next, subscribing to the RSS feed is the perfect solution. Now they can enjoy new posts, articles and content just as fast as it goes online. Surfing via RSS reader saves time by eliminating the need to visit each site individually. Second, many visitors are concerned with their privacy and really aren’t crazy about adding yet another newsletter to their already overflowing inbox. Of course, you can and should offer your feed by email but the option of getting your content sent to their reader appeals to many.

The benefits of syndicating your site include driving more traffic to your website, increasing your search engine ranking and it’s very low cost. So low cost, in fact, it’s free. Perhaps the best reason to use RSS marketing is it builds relationships. Nothing is more powerful in marketing than a large group of dedicated readers/buyers that like your brand and feel comfortable with you. You can use RSS feeds to earn the trust of your subscribers and that in turn will convert some of them to buyers. Your feed can also be placed on other websites. A webmaster just adds your feed to an aggregator and your feed will show on their website. Can you ask for any more?

List building

Every marketer understands the importance of list building and email marketing. Your RSS subscribers are indeed another valuable list. Whether they subscribe to your feed by email or in a reader, your marketing message is getting out. I don’t want to just breeze over the list aspect because this is big! Some of the top blogs have a feed subscriber counts well over half a million. Now that,s a big list by anyone’s standard.

With RSS feeds, you don’t have to worry about spam complaints, spam filters, IPS blocking, blacklisting or unsubscribes. I’m not suggesting you abandon your traditional list or the idea of building traditional lists. You should use both. Both methods compliment one another and building a subscriber base from both list building methods will increase your reach and strengthen your brand faster.

Recommendations

I use a third party list management company, AWeber, for my traditional lists and they also allow me to easily send my content as a RSS feed along with the email delivery. If you’re looking for a top-shelf auto-responder and list management company you can’t go wrong with AWeber.

I use FeedBurner for all of my Blogs, that’s over a dozen so far. FeedBurner is widely respected and they are the pros when it come to feeds.

Best bet

The quickest and easiest way to get started with your own RSS feed is to start a blog. Blogs by design are already ‘fitted‘ for RSS feeds and they’re very easy to start and maintain. Once you have your blog and feed setup the way you want you can concentrate on quality content. Blogs are interactive websites that are very user friendly as well as search engine magnets. You can start your own blog and host it free on a number of sites such as WordPress and Blogger.

A few quick tips

The fastest way to learn about RSS feeds is by subscribing to some yourself. Be careful, it’s very addicting.

Submit your RSS feed to the RSS directories. Just like blog and article directories, there are quality RSS directories you can add your feed to.

Trade subscriptions. Have your online friends subscribe to yours and you subscribe to theirs. Remember networking? It’s still important.

One trick I learned from the pros is to link your images to their actual URL. Many readers won’t show the graphics in the feed so having a clickable link is a nice touch. That way the subscriber can simply click the link to see the image.

Give your articles descriptive titles. When scanning posts in the reader or email, most will skip what doesn’t look interesting.

Subscribe to yourself. The best way to see what they see is by subscribing to your own feeds. Understand that not all readers and email clients are created equal.

Get it right the first time. Before you hit that publish button make sure everything is correct. Check links, spelling and everything else. Once it goes out it’s out and too late to change it.

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Article originally posted on Traffic Bag

RSS image from PINKZAP.com