10 Ways to Increase RSS Subscribers

One way one bloggers gain readers is through RSS (Really Simple Syndication). RSS is a family of web feed formats used to publish regularly updated works such as blog entries, news headlines as well as audio and video in standardized form. RSS feed benefit publishers by letting them syndicate content automatically. I use Feedburner as a my RSS feed and management tool. There are many feed and management tools to choose from. Just do a google search and you'll find one. I find Feedburner quite adequate and it is one of the most popular ones around. If you have a Blogger blog you may generally use your GFC (Google Friends Connect) plug-in to gain subscribers/followers as well as an RSS feed. But for other blog formats such as Wordpress, they use an RSS feed for their subscribers. In general, bloggers want more subscribers and more subscribers hopefully leads to increased readership. So how can you increase your RSS subscribers? Here are 10 tips.

1. Make sure your RSS icon is highly visible and is placed above the fold. Meaning on the top of the page without having to scroll down to view it.


2. Don't overwhelm your new subscribers with extraneous posts. You don't want their feed to be cluttered with posts they don't want to read, which could lead them to unsubscribe from your blog. So make every post count.


3. Use your RSS feed link when you comment on other blogs. Instead of using your blog URL, put in your feed URL and that way it leads people to your feed to subscribe.


4. Make sure to display the RSS icon on every page of your blog. That way people don't have to go back to your home page to subscribe if they decide to follow your blog. Remember people are busy, make it easier for them every step of the way.


5. Urge your readers to subscribe at the end of every post.


6. Make it easy for visitors to subscribe to your blog. Make the subscription button highly visible and easy to utilize.


7. Offer your readers something for free in return that they subscribe to your blog. This can be done with a free ebook, newsletter, giveaway or contest.


8. Offer category feeds so visitors can choose a specific category or topic that interest them. This way they don't have to subscribe to the entire blog.


9. Utilize cross RSS promotion. Get other bloggers to advertise and promote your blog feed on their blog and vice versa.

10. Make sure to explain to your readers or visitors what RSS is so they know why it's important to subscribe and utilize it. Some people have no idea what the RSS icon is for and thus they don't use it.

One helpful tip: Make sure to check your feed periodically to make sure your feed is working and your link is working.

Hope you found some helpful tips today. Now be a dear and please subscribe to my RSS feed in the upper right hand corner :-)

Google Reader for Newbies...What is it?

As a blogger it can be extremely helpful to have a system of organizing the blogs you visit or plan to visit. I find it easier to manage the blogs I follow with Google Reader. 


What is Google Reader you ask? 
Well, Google Reader is a free, Web-based reader for RSS feeds. RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication. These feeds can be found on most every web site. RSS feeds provide a simple view of content, including pictures, text and video without the sites' style and formatting and allows websites to distribute new content as it becomes available.

RSS Feeds can be found by this universal symbol. 

How do you find RSS Feeds? 
Google Reader allows you to subscribe to feeds easily by clicking on the RSS universal symbol and subscribing. There are different RSS readers available, but Google is my favorite and one of the best in my opinion. So lets say for instance, you have a Blogger blog and want to follow a WordPress blog. Since Blogger has decided to retire Google Friend Connect for all non-Blogger sites on March 1, 2012, in order to follow a WordPress blog, you would need to bookmark it, search for it with a search engine, type the url directly into your address bar or subscribe through an RSS feed to stay up to date. By subscribing through RSS, you can find the blogs you subscribe to in one location, which is your Google Reader.


To find the RSS feed to subscribe to on a website, look for the orange box with the white arches like in the photo above. Now if you don't remember the website url you want to subscribe to, you can find it within your Google Reader, type in the name of the site or use a keyword in the search box and Google will usually find it for you with its own directory.

I subscribed to several feeds, but how do I organize them? 
Now that you have subscribed to several blogs using the RSS feed, you can organize how you access or view the sites within your Google Reader. The less complicated way to find your Google Reader is to sign into your Gmail account. If you don't have one, it's easy to sign up for one, just go to Gmail.com and sign up.  Once you are inside your gmail, you will see a list of tabs at the top, the very last tab should say more. Click More and then scroll until you see Reader. Click it. Now you should be in your Google Reader. Now to organize the feeds/sites you subscribed to, you should create folders. Click manage subscriptions in the lower left hand corner of the main page of your Google Reader. There you will find options to create or delete folders. One of my folders is called, My Favorite Blogs, to help me navigate to my favorite blogs without having to search. You can also delete feeds and categorize feeds into folders for better viewing.

How do I create a folder? 
Your feeds will be in the left sidebar. On the right side of each feed, there is a drop down menu with a black arrow to change or make a new folder, bundle, etc. Click the arrow and then create a new folder, click on it, and choose the new folder option. After naming it, the feed you clicked on in the first place will automatically be sorted into this folder. Once you've created a folder, you can quickly add several feeds by clicking the drop-down button on the far right to change folders.

How do I star a post?

You can also star and label a post for quick sorting later. I often do this when I'm pressed for time and then I'll go back to my starred post and categorize them. You can star a post by clicking on the star icon on the top left of the post, or add a star option on the bottom left. To find the posts you starred, click the starred items feed on the top left menu.

How do I label a post?

If you blog, you probably know what labeling is, it's like adding a tag. To label or tag any feed item, click the edit tags button on the lower right hand side of the post. To search or find labels or tags, you will need to use a keyboard shortcut; pressing g followed by t. This allows you to go through stories by tag using your keyboard arrows. 

To learn more about Google Reader watch the video below. Or visit Google Reader Help and Support.