Business: Deliver Information Safely
Businesses that are not using feeds today, as part of their marketing and advertising plans, will soon do so, or should thinking of implementing them soon. Although this is a fairly new communications tool it is growing rapidly. The reason is that the information gatherer, consumers, etc., are or will be using readers to view information. The main reason is that information can be viewed with No Spam, No Junk Mail and No Viruses threats.
Don't worry, if you think you are behind the times, because you are not. People are just starting to get wind of the "Feeds Method" of gathering information. But if you prepare now, there's a good chance you may be well ahead of your competition.
The good news is that feeds are good for any size business, even if you don't have a web site. Companies such as ours, provides for any size business, online or offline, big or small, to get their information to their customers safely.
The big reason feeds are becoming so popular is that there is no transfer of information to the user's computer. Unlike e-mail there is no data sent to the user's hard drive. The user cannot be spammed or sent junk mail or download a virus using a feeds reader. The feeds reader user, your customers etc., controls the information they view.
Business finds it exciting because people will use the feeds reader to gather information and stay updated on products, services and information they have an interest in. Some businesses, that have been using mailing lists, have been frustrated in the last couple of years with the increase of Spam and junk mail filters. Many of their customers simple do not receive or read the messages sent because the filters read the mail as Spam or Junk Mail and most times deleted.
As well small, and home based businesses, can now get equal billing with the world's largest companies. On our site we list the smallest company with the biggest. It's up to the user which feeds they enter into their reader to view.
How It Works.
Consumers, or web surfers use a reader to view feeds. Let's say a consumer visits your web site and you have a feed for them to use if they wish. You would list the feed URL for them to copy and a small icon that indicates if it is an RSS or XML file etc. They copy and paste the feed URL into their reader and view you feed. The feed has one or more items. Each item has a title, such as "ABC Home Decor", a small description such as "Visit our store or web site to get 40% off all in stock furniture", and a link to the page you want your visitors to view on your web site or if you don't have a web site a page we would provide you.
The feed itself, which can contain one or many items, is a basic file. It is a RSS or XML file that is stored on your server or on ours. The consumer reads the file with a reader. The file is not a web page but similar to an e-mail message without the data transfer to the user's computer.
You can update the feed 24/7, thus having the most up to date information on hand for the viewer of the feed. Whether you run a large online or offline corporation, a small business in a small town, or a home business, you can update your customers and potential customers immediately and 24/7.
The Bottom Line.
Really you don't need to know how feeds work, unless you are going to do it yourself. Simply understand that feeds are an exciting new communication tool that anyone can use. They are safe, and can be updated in real time. Feeds are easy to add to readers and easy to implement on your web site or from your offline business. They are something you should seriously consider for your business.
About The Author
Bob Power has been an Internet entrepreneur for longer than he would like to remember. He is the president of Your Future Lifestyle a company that guides people on the relaistic way to create multiple streams of income online. Get our free eBook.
These articles my be reproduced exactly as shown above. No revisions or changes are permitted. http://yourfuturelifestyle.com/
Tuesday, April 21, 2009 | 0 Comments
How To Display RSS Feeds on Your Website
This article is intended as a guide for webmasters who want to display automatically updated content on their website in the form of RSS feeds. In this article I will cover the easiest method to implement using javascript for displaying RSS on websites to create additional dynamic content. This will allow you to display headlines from syndicated content around the web on your website.
RSS to Javascript.
By far the easiest method is to use client side javascript to parse and display the headlines on your site. To achieve this all you need to do is cut and paste some HTML or javascript code into the web page where you want the RSS feed headlines to display.
To achieve this there are several sites that offer a free service that will allow you to select a few options to choose your feed source and display formatting parameters. You will then be presented with some javascript code that you can cut and paste into your website.
Now before I give you the address of the sites that offer this service freely there are a few points I need to clarify with you. Although you will achieve your goal of displaying dynamic content on your site in a few short minutes there are some downsides to this method.
Javascript is not search engine friendly.
As you may or may not already know, javascript is not visible to search engine spiders. They will not see the RSS feed you have parsed into your site and so this will not benefit you if you are doing this to better your search engine rankings.
You are using a third party service.
The second potential downside is that although the javascript is on your site you are actually calling a script on another server. This could lead to a couple of potential problems. If the server is busy it will mean the news feed will take longer to display on your site. The other point is if the third party server fails or disappears altogether then your feed will not be displayed at all.
In summary there are a few downsides, but if you do not code and want some feeds on your site quickly then this is the way to go. Ok, so now you understand what is involved here are the links to the sites that provide the free RSS to javascript service. All you need to do is follow the on site instructions.
* Feed2JS: http://jade.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/feed/index.php?s=build
* RSS2HTML: http://www.rss2html.com/step-1.php
* RSS-to-Javascript: http://www.rss-to-javascript.com/p/138.html
* FeedSweep: http://www.howdev.com/services/feedsweep/create_adv.asp
* RSS Xpress Lite: http://rssxpress.ukoln.ac.uk/lite/include/?t=1
Allan is the webmaster at http://www.newsniche.com an RSS resopurce for webmasters. Learn how to use RSS to attract and retain visitors to your site.
Tuesday, April 21, 2009 | 0 Comments
A New Face of Online Marketing
Today we see the Internet as a global catalog of information, and the Internet thrives on information. But information, which is fresh and new, is more valuable than out dated content. And that’s the reason why most of the Webmasters try to keep their sites updated.
In the recent years we have seen webmasters trying different methods to keep their content updated. However, a new face of online marketing is gaining popularity all over the web. It’s called RSS and its helping webmasters spread their content all over the web, like wildfire.
RSS (“Really Simple Syndication” or “Rich Site Summery”), is widely used to deliver content to your website users without any restriction.
For marketing your website and promoting it to target audience, you need creative strategies that build brand awareness, increase site traffic, and ensure that you are the best around in giving quality content. And RSS lets you do it with conviction.
Using RSS for marketing can help you integrate your website with your other marketing initiatives, develop winning strategies to drive targeted users to your site and in the process increase overall traffic and sales.
RSS today is getting very popular. It has changed the face of online marketing because with this technology webmasters can deliver their new latest content which is published on there website to his/her targeted users and also display it directly on their web page.
RSS Feeds are made in XML format, this XML file can be made very easily all by your self if you’re a programmer, as I’m sure XML is much easier then any other programming language. But if you don’t have any idea how to go about with the programming part, there are websites who can help you in making your own RSS Feed for your website, all you got to do is make an account on there website, they will guide you thorough some sequence of steps and your RSS Feed will be ready to get published.
RSS can increase your website traffic very rapidly here are some benefits listed below:
Stop your messages from getting blocked by strong spam filters
Provide New and Fresh Information on Your website, which encourages users to return to Your website.
Automate content delivery to your website users.
The Content can reach your Targeted Users with out Fail.
Drastically improve your search engine ranking and reach your target audience with ease
Boost your lead generation, easily add new subscribers and zoom past your competition that continues to use email.
As the name “Rich Site Summary” suggest that the RSS Feed is the summary of the actual content, without overwhelming the reader with superfluous details. If the reader is interested and wants additional information they can click on the item in the feed to accessing the website which contains additional details about that feed Item, RSS readers aggregate multiple feeds, making it easy for individuals to quickly scan information contained within each feed. Feeds are generally themed, allowing users to opt-in for the feeds that are of interest to them.
So if your website is not having this new technology, get started and join this new revolution.
Ibrahim Quraishi is the co-founder of http://www.rapidfeeds.com, a free online service that helps anyone deliver targeted content to their subscribers through RSS. Sign Up for your FREE account on his site to put an end to blocked messages and add more subscribers.
Tuesday, April 21, 2009 | 0 Comments
Easy RSS for Bloggers
Do you need help adding RSS feeds to your blogger? It’s really easy and here is how you can do it:
Log into your blogger account
Go to "settings"
Go to "site feed"
Copy the "site feed url"
Then go to www.feedburner.com
Scroll down to "try feedburner today" and paste your "site feed url" and then click next. You'll be at "select services" There are lots of options on that page and you can look through them all, but to get to the feeds you need to go to the bottom of that page and click on "next".
Then you can log in or sign up. It's free to sign up. After you fill in your info then click and that page will allow you to "activate your feed". Click on that and then click on "launch your publicity tools" and then click on "chicklet chooser". Then you have many options. I personally always choose the “my yahoo”, “my msn”, “newsgator” and “xml”. Click on each one and you'll see the code you need to grab. You have to do it for each one.
Then just go back to your template and put it in. You're set.
As you can see there are other different things you can do too. So look around in there and check them all out.
But that is just the very basics of getting a feed up.
Now, when you get that feed added let me know so I can add you to my personal “my yahoo” page!
Nell Taliercio is the owner of a leading work at home mom resource website packed full of unique information for the telecommuter, business owner and virtual assistant.
Visit http://www.mommysplace.net today!
Monday, April 20, 2009 | 0 Comments
Find Out How Microsoft's Plans Could Make Your Subscribers Beg You for RSS Content!
Microsoft recently announced that they will be releasing a new browser version sometime this summer. The new browser version was to be released with Longhorn, the code name for their next operating system to replace Windows XP, but they decided that they needed to release it sooner than that.
Many think the reason is because Firefox, the new popular browser, has introduced some key features that many surfers have come to expect. This probably has put pressure on Microsoft to respond with a browser with the same specs.
One of these key features is tabbed browsing, which allows you to browse to multiple sites using just one window with tabs rather than opening a new window for each page.
But tabbed browsing isn't all...
I am really excited about the possibility of a new feature that could change the way web-surfers get their content!
Although there has been no formal announcement about this, there has been a lot of speculation about the new browser including a built-in RSS reader.
An RSS what???
Let me explain...
RSS has taken off like a rocket. Blog sites love it, and every major website out there now supports it including CNN, ESPN, Yahoo, Google, and MSN.
RSS is nothing more than a format for delivering article headlines that can be read and neatly displayed by RSS readers, much like an email program displays email messages.
But so far the popularity of RSS has been confined mainly to blogsites and tech-saavy individuals who know how to "tune in" to an RSS Feed. Though it is spreading like wildfire, many average web users have no idea what RSS is! (I've confirmed that by recently asking several of my friends, and none of them had ever heard of it!)
This is all about to change!
Microsoft has very good reason to include an RSS reader with their new IE version. If they don't, surfers may have reason to switch to another that does. Firefox already includes an RSS reader.
If they DO include an RSS reader, think of the implications:
*You could browse to a webpage and IE could "discover" any RSS links on the page and notify you of them
*You may be able to Right-Click on an RSS Feed and have an option to "Add to RSS Reader", which would instantly subscribe you to the Feed.
*Web developers may be able to write web pages that allow visitors to automatically subscribe to a feed by clicking a button or submitting a form.
Remember, Firefox already has all these features, but the vast majority still uses IE!
Once visitors learn how RSS works and figure out how easy and convenient it is, RSS will become the expected format.
Soon you will be FORCED to offer RSS content because consumers will not want to hand out their email address anymore!
The time will come...will you be ready to deliver?
Feel free to reprint this article so long as you include the resource box listed with the article.
Kent Thompson is the creator of FeedMagic, a full-featured sequential autoresponder program that allows your subscribers to choose between Email or a personalized RSS Feed for delivery. To find out how you can use the power of RSS for your website, visit: http://FeedMagic.com
Monday, April 20, 2009 | 0 Comments
Is RSS Here to Stay or Gone Tomorrow?
RSS is totally hot. We have seen it everywhere, from John-Doe blogsites to major news websites. If you haven't heard of RSS before, that's okay, because I hadn't either until a couple of months ago!
RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication, or whatever you want it to stand for. (I have seen it also stand for RDF Site Summary, but it really doesn't matter.) What's important is what it does.
Here's how RSS works:
Every site that has constantly changing content has one big problem: How do you notify your visitors when you've posted new content without them having to scour your entire site every 30 mins? You could send them an email, but that has several drawbacks.
First, you might not get your messages through the spam filters. Filters are snatching more and more messages, and just to keep up anymore you have to run all your content through rating systems just to find the likelyhood of it getting blocked. What a pain in the neck!
Second, people are so hesitant to give out their closely guarded email address. I know I guard my email address with my life. How can your visitors trust you if they just clicked to your site? You could be an underground spam operation for all they care.
This is where RSS is awesome!
Instead of sending an email, you can have your website generate what's called an RSS Feed. An RSS Feed is nothing more than a webpage with a bunch of summaries of the new content on it. Next time you see that little orange icon with XML or RSS, click on it and you'll see what I mean. The summaries are formatted in such a way that an RSS Reader can sort them out and display them neatly.
There are tons of free RSS Readers now, so if you don't have one, do a simple Google search for RSS Reader and you should have no trouble finding one.
All the visitor has to do is copy the little orange RSS icon link and paste it into their RSS Reader program. The RSS program will periodically download the RSS webpage and will display the new headlines much like your email program will display your subject lines. If you like one of the headlines, you can click on it and it will display a short description and a link to the entire article. If you want to read more, click the link and it will display the actual full article on the website.
Here's why this is killer:
You can now be notified of the new content or headlines posted to all your favorite websites without having to do very much work! Imagine putting twenty RSS Feeds into your reader and having it download all the content in a matter of seconds instead of having to surf to each site individually!
If you ask me, RSS is here to stay. All the major sites support it like CNN, ESPN, Yahoo and Google, so that surely is a good sign! So go on and fire up Google and get yourself an RSS Reader. You will be glad you did...I sure was!
Feel free to reprint this article so long as you include the resource box listed with the article.
Kent Thompson is the creator of FeedMagic, a full-featured sequential autoresponder program that allows your subscribers to choose between Email or a personalized RSS Feed for delivery. To find out how you can use the power of RSS for your website, click here: http://FeedMagic.com
Monday, April 20, 2009 | 0 Comments
6 Reasons Why RSS Beats Email Marketing
A brand new marketing tool predicted to replace email is currently sweeping the World Wide Web like a storm.
The Internet is experiencing the so-called “orange” revolution and there’s no stopping to it. The online marketing world is rigorously seen chanting a 3-letter mantra, R-S-S.
Yes, RSS is here and it’s got substance, material, style, sophistication…
In a word, it’s got the ‘X’ factor.
RSS, which stands for “Really Simple Syndication”, is the newest and the fastest growing technology online. Many publishers, webmasters and marketers are adopting RSS. It has helped spam go down to a great extent and made bulk messages a thing of past.
No wonder spammers are shaking in their boots all over the web!
Here are 6 strong reasons why RSS beats email marketing to the core:
1. Kiss Spam Filters Goodbye - RSS can help you distribute your content directly to your subscribers, without any spam filters interfering. Your messages will never get blacklisted and blocked and will always be delivered promptly, unless and until your subscribers choose to end the relationship themselves.
2. Subscribing Is Easy - Your subscribers don't have to worry about giving out any of their personal details to subscribe and read your RSS feeds. All they need to do is, add your feed to their online or desktop RSS reader and that’s it. They are ready to receive and read content from you without any hassles.
3. Un-subscribing Is Easier - Removing your subscriber’s email from your email list automatically has it’s own share of problems, and it doesn’t work all the time. However, when you talk about RSS, it’s easy for your subscribers to unsubscribe from your publication. They can stop receiving messages from you any time by simply deleting your feed from their RSS reader. Simple as that!
4. Get Your Message Out In An Instant - Whenever you have something new to publish, all you have to do is update your already published feed and your message gets updated everywhere it’s subscribed. No more worrying if your subscribers got your message or not.
5. Never Get Accused of Spam - It’s very easy to get accused of sending unsolicited mail nowadays since people forget they even gave you their email address. RSS solves this problem completely, as the messages which you send out, will appear directly in your subscribers RSS reader. So the question of contacting them illegally does not even arise.
6. Build Long Lasting Relationships - Not only RSS builds a strong relationship with your existing subscribers but also helps in attracting new potent subscribers who are interested in what you offer. People who subscribe to your feed want to receive content from you and hence, can be regarded as subscribers you can count on.
RSS can work like a charm for your business and help you gain thousands of quality subscribers and leads within a few weeks…
You just have to become a part of the orange revolution!
Mustafa Khundmiri is the co-founder of http://www.rapidfeeds.com - A Free online service, which helps anyone, create, edit, publish and track RSS feeds online. Sign Up for your FREE account on his site and start publishing your own RSS feeds!
Sunday, April 19, 2009 | 0 Comments
RSS And The Billion Channel Internet
The real potential of RSS lies in Broadcasting.
In former times, jumping up on a soapbox or any platform in the street to speak your mind was a popular pastime. Mainly reserved for political radicals, the biblically inspired or the Cuckoo's frequent flyer's club - the soapbox did fill a need.
The need to express oneself.
I have always thought of RSS/Blogs and blogging as more of a 'soapbox' than a 'journal' or a 'weblog' of daily events. A modern day techno version of the soapbox with the transfer of one's firmly held beliefs/opinions in a few kb's here and there along the information highway.
The stronger the beliefs or opinions - the more popular the blog. The more unique the content - the more entertaining the blog is to read.
It also gives you a platform for entertaining off-beat ideas and new ways of thinking. And it's a very democratic platform - where anyone's input can be just as valid as another.
Forget the vote, the blog is a much more democratic tool.
And it's very young. It has a long way to go.
Nothing stays the same, everything changes, everything evolves -- even our methods of thinking, our means of expressing ourselves. RSS/Blogs is changing the way we communicate.
Imagine a Model T, a Fifties Cadillac, and a present day Ferrari in your mind. Now imagine your vision or view of the automobile if you only had the Model T to base it on? the Cadillac?
Don't underestimate or even judge RSS by its present day form - this soapbox is morphing as you read this!
Ever wonder what RSS/blogs will be like in fifty or a hundred years? What about websites? What about the Internet? We're only at the Model T stage - ever wonder what that Ferrari will look like?
Lately, I can't get that idea out of my head! What blogs, the web, all this will be like in fifty years, a hundred years, a thousand years? Personally, the future of RSS is what interests me the most.
I have some background in the art field, people in that field are always looking ahead. Artists are trained to think 'in', 'outside', and 'ahead' of the box. Especially ahead of the box - five shots ahead of the cue ball - at all times.
For an artist, it's a pure matter of survival. They have to be ahead of crowd just to be mildly interesting. The real fortune tellers leap ahead of the pack. Forging the way.
Blogs and RSS are forging the way for new ideas, new methods of expression...it's our own little wired soapbox...just waiting for you to step up. And that soapbox is expanding and evolving -- What will that 'soapbox' morph into?
Blogs/RSS will evolve and change. No doubt it will turn that wired soapbox into your own personal interactive TV channel -- broadcasting your ideas, opinions, products onto a billion channel internet...
Sound too far-fetched? Well, the radio version of this system is just starting. Podcasting is just turning the corner - read more about it in this Forbes.com Article.
If we have radio, TV can't be far behind! And the key is RSS.
RSS gives us our own publishing facility, but it's more akin to broadcasting than publishing. It broadcasts our ideas, our websites, our products...
Basically, I believe, RSS is paving the way for a billion channel internet where each website will be it's own interactive tv channel. As storage space, transmission, download times... becomes irreverent or instantaneous --- how can it not happen?
As we crave more visuals, more audio, and more instant gratification from the internet and webpages; how can RSS not deliver it?
The foundation, the infrastructure and the groundwork are already present; connecting the dots will only be a matter of time.
So keep your eye on the cursor and don't underestimate or even judge RSS by its present day form; this soapbox is morphing as you read this!
And grab that remote; thanks to RSS, surfing a billion TV channels may just become your favorite pastime or nightmare in the very near future.
----
To Put RSS On Your Site Within Minutes - Visit This Link:
RSS and Blogging Guide
Copyright © 2005 - Bizwaremagic.com
This article may be freely distributed if this resource
box stays attached. Visit http://www.bizwaremagic.com/blog
for more mildly amusing RSS/Blog content.
Sunday, April 19, 2009 | 0 Comments
Simple Syndication (RSS) -- Where's The Payoff?
How RSS really does pay off...
Have you heard of RSS (Really Simple Syndication)? Did you know you can syndicate your news stories from your website? You probably have seen some orange buttons around the web with the letters "RSS" on them. They allow other websites to link to your news stories with just a click. Simple. Syndicate.
Ok. Now, you know about Really Simple Syndication... but where's the payoff? Let's look at the ways that RSS can pay off for you. And, pay off, it does -- when you use this emerging technology effectively.Now by "emerging technology," we mean it is relatively new, and people are still learning about it. But already many savvy webmasters are "aggregating" RSS feeds -- pulling common topic feeds together at their websites. And, big players like Yahoo, and Amazon are offering up RSS solutions. You can "subscribe" to a selection of news feeds on your personalized home page at Yahoo, for example.
Feed me... feed me...
There's even a search engine just for RSS feeds, called Feedster.com, that currently returns over 4,645,164 feeds indexed and fully searchable. Last August, there were only a quarter of a million feeds. Feedster reports that around 5,000 new feeds are being added... per day. Someone's hungry. And this hunger for feeds is being fed by millions of "blog" websites that use automated "Content Management Systems" to turn out their RSS news feeds. At Feedster.com, you can simply search through millions of them, or you may "subscribe" there to the feeds of your choice, creating a sort of customized electronic newspaper for yourself.
Looks like RSS is here to stay, so what does a "pay off" from RSS mean? Will it mean increased traffic to your website? Yes. Could it mean an increase in sales of your services or products? Yes, but probably not as immediately as direct advertising would. What about P.R. value? Yes... most definitely.
Traffic Boost: It's key to understand that when your stories are well-written and of interest (two major considerations -- write professionally for your best success), people will subscribe to your RSS "feeds." They will want to read them. Next, when they like your story, and its focus, they will naturally be curious to learn more. Include links to your site in your news. From this you can boost the traffic to your site. This is a sort of new generation of what was known as "reciprocal linking" where, in its simplest form, you got more traffic to your site by exchanging links with other websites covering similar material. Now instead of a link... you provide full articles which may reference your products, services, websites, and perhaps those of your clients.
Public Relations Value -- the P.R. Factor: Does your firm have a Public Relations strategy? It should. Does it include RSS? It must. You see Public Relations professionals are already talking about RSS in glowing terms like how it is "providing additional channels to amplify supportive messaging." Hey... translated this means any word you can get out on the street makes your business and its market offerings stronger and much better known. What's that worth to you? Advertising execs are talking about how this can help boost "brand loyalty". Huh? Hey, if you're in business, your company identity gets branded (or not, unfortunately) into the minds of customers and prospects. A good brand wins loyal customers. RSS news feeds, done properly, do precisely this for your company. And one more thing... RSS installed on your site automates a process that can cost quite a lot done manually by a big P.R. Agency. Shsssss.
So where are the sales? The formula is simple: the more your company and its offerings becomes known and favored by customers and prospects alike, they more sales will result. How many sales? To take a shot at a preliminary answer, I did searched for it using... you guessed it... a search of RSS feeds about advertising results. I'll end this article with an overview of articles reporting on those results, but please be clear about one thing -- people want NEWS in their RSS feeds -- news they can use. Advertising is secondary, and many sites are reporting the rejection of blatant and direct ads. Remember, banner ads are dead. "Product placement" (like when you see an Apple computer in a movie) -- mentioning of related products and services in news, blogs, and RSS feeds is not dead. It's working.
Initial RSS Marketing Results... proceed with caution
Here are a couple of links to articles that have studied the results of RSS, and ads in RSS feeds:
1. RSS Advertising Case Study. Overview. Pheedo reports that by integrating online advertising into an RSS feed, a new online advertising technique, it has achieved measurably better results than e-mail for its client. Read More at: http://www.pheedo.info/archives/000057.html
2. Blocking of Ads in RSS feeds already envisioned. Of course. People want news to be news. They might put up with informative links, but not blatant, outright, defiant, in-your-face advertising. You can read a blog of comments on this issue at Kottke.org
What are you serving?
The feed goes on. Advertising and no advertising. Straight news articles, and Public Relations pieces with positive spins on your company and its products. The bottom line? If you're going to have a website and write professional content, why not syndicate the news articles and greatly extend your reach and influence? It's really simple, and it doesn't cost that much.
\Scott Frangos is a writer, designer, and eCommerce marketer with over 20 years experience in Advertising. He has taught eCommerce, HTML, and Business courses at the college level in Portland, Oregon, and currently is Managing Partner of WebFadds.com - http://www.webfadds.com
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Scott_Frangos
Sunday, April 19, 2009 | 0 Comments
Why Every Site Needs RSS
RSS or 'Really Simple Syndication' is not just for Blogs and News sites. Every website can benefit from this newly popular technology. The term 'syndication' is what throws a lot of people off the track. Syndication is like news articles, isn't it?
Well it can be. But think of it like this. If you had a bricks-and-mortar store and decided to carry a new product line, how would you let people know? You could advertise of course, but a better and free alternative is to send a news release to the local paper. Their business section may carry your announcement free of charge.
Now back to our cyber-store in virtual space. If you add a new web page, or make substantial changes to existing pages, how do you let your customers (both former and future) know? You can email your former customers, but spam blocking software will prevent half of them from getting your message. And keeping track of mailing lists, unsubscribe requests and address changes is nothing short of a nightmare.
Instead, post a news release using RSS. Interested customers will have their newsreader programs watching for your announcements, and will get the news as soon as you send it out. The announcement will include a link to the new or changed page, and your customer can click on it if they are interested. True, fewer will click through than might read an email from you -- but those who do will arrive at your site in a much more receptive frame of mind. And those email readers still need to click through to your site to see your new page anyhow.
If you make frequent additions or changes to your site you should have your own RSS feed. Check out these sites to learn how to make your own feed:
Making An RSS Feed
http://searchenginewatch.com/sereport/article.php/2175271
How To Get Your Web Site Content Syndicated
http://www.high-search-engine-ranking.com/How_To_Get_Your_Web_Site_Content_Syndicated.htm
Or you might want to try these programs to format your information, so you can post it to your website:
ListGarden RSS Feed Generator Program
Windows, Mac OS X, or Linux, open source
http://www.softwaregarden.com/products/listgarden/index.html
RSS Headliner
Create RSS Feed file on-line to copy and post to your site.
http://www.webdevtips.com/webdevtips/codegen/rss.shtml
But what if you don't often make changes or additions to your site? There is a new site that offers a solution to that problem. Shared RSS provides feed by TOPIC rather than publisher. So you simply post your message in the appropriate topic category (there are thousands to choose from) and share your feed with others publishing on the same topic. It is a free service that you certainly should use if you do not publish your own feed.
http://www.sharedrss.com/
Wouldn't that mean (I can hear someone object) that I would be sharing a feed with my competition? Well yes, but that isn't a bad thing. It's like all those antique stores that congregate in the same part of town -- shoppers flock there and wander store to store, to the benefit of all.
Don't kid yourself, customers already know about your competition. For every customer of yours who visits their sites because they found an RSS link on your site, you will receive one, two or three visits from potential customers who found your information on an RSS link they discovered on your competitors site, or in a catalog of RSS feeds. The benefit far outweighs the risk.
And RSS feeds are not just for business. If other sites submit to the shared feed they will bring with them more people interested in that topic, who may become your future customers.
No, RSS is not just for Blogs anymore! Start your own or submit to a shared feed, either way you can only benefit.
The following article may be freely reprinted in digital formats or print, so long as the 'about the author' box is left intact. If placed online or in a medium supporting live links, the links should be activated.
About The Author
Andrew J. Morris is the owner and creator of SharedRSS -- a website that allows all website owners to syndicate their newly added material for FREE. http://www.sharedrss.com/
Saturday, April 18, 2009 | 0 Comments
The Making of a Feed
Everyday more and more websites, news services and blogs are adding RSS content. RSS is a method of syndicating content.The concept of aggregating content in one central location or repository is very appealing. Consumers have become tired of push technology, RSS allows users the flexibility to regain control of their content. RSS feed creators provide content without forcing it on consumers. In fact with RSS consumers are able to choose the content they wish to view.
How to Make an RSS Feed
RSS feeds contain what are referred to as "items". The items are usually connected in some way and contain a common theme or other similarity.
The following feed http://www.notepage.net/feed.xml contains eight items. The items are all SMS and paging related news articles that would likely benefit someone interested in the wireless market.
Each item contains:
title
description
link
The title and description should be written to describe the content and the link should reference the webpage that contains that actual content.
Like html, the xml file uses open and close tags to designate the title, description and link. Tags are enclosed in brackets , like standard html and the close tag contains a forward slash /.
The following is what an item in a xml file looks like:
The Title Goes Here
The description goes here
http://www.linkgoeshere.com
As I mentioned earlier, an RSS feeds contains items and like the tags above, an open and close tag is used to distinguish between items.
The Title Goes Here
The description goes here
http://www.linkgoeshere.com
Another Title Goes Here
Another description goes here
http://www.anotherlinkgoeshere.com
Now an RSS Feed is a series of items, these items are chained together to create what is called a "Channel".
The Channel appears at the top of the file and tells people how the items relate to each other. Like items channels use title, description and link tags to describe its content. The open channel tag occurs before the first item and the close tag occurs after the last item.
The Channel Title Goes Here
The explanation of how the items are related goes here
http://www.directoryoflinksgohere
The Title Goes Here
The description goes here
http://www.linkgoeshere.com
Another Title Goes Here
Another description goes here
http://www.anotherlinkgoeshere.com
Finally you will need to designate the file by indicating it is an XML file by inserting xml and rss defining tags at the beginning and at the very end.
The Channel Title Goes Here
The explanation of how the items are related goes here
http://www.directoryoflinksgohere
The Title Goes Here
The description goes here
http://www.linkgoeshere.com
Another Title Goes Here
Another description goes here
http://www.anotherlinkgoeshere.com
When you save the file be sure to save it as an xml file.
Warning
If you create the file using Dreamweaver or a similar tool becareful that it does not strip out tags it feels are redundant. In order to be be an RSS feed your file needs at bare minimum that tags that were discussed above, and the file will not be valid if tags are stripped out.
I found a cool little free program that helped in xml file creation called First Object Editor http://www.firstobject.com/
Validation
As my math teacher use to say, check your work! Once your file is complete and uploaded einter it into the feed validator at http://feedvalidator.org
Syndication / Submission
If you've made it this far you are in good shape it is time to "syndicate" your content! Submit your RSS feed (the xml file you created) to sites just like you would submit a web page. Some of the more popular sites that accept RSS files can be found under "Post RSS Feed"
About The Author
Sharon Housley manages marketing for NotePage, Inc. http://www.notepage.net a company specializing in alphanumeric paging, SMS and wireless messaging software solutions. Other sites by Sharon can be found at http://www.softwaremarketingresource.com , and http://www.small-business-software.net
Saturday, April 18, 2009 | 0 Comments
Shared RSS - Syndication for the Rest of Us
RSS Syndication or RSS Newsfeeds (RSS Feeds for short) all refer to the same thing. There are two parts to the process, the publisher, and the consumer. The publisher produces a small text file in a special format that lists the title and address of an article or resource published on the World Wide Web. The consumer uses a program, usually called an aggregator to read and display the contents of that simple text file, with links to the web page. Or the consumer may visit a website that includes an aggregator program, and view the results as a web page. Members of Yahoo.com, for example, can set their personal 'My Yahoo' pages to display the contents of any RSS feeds they select.
That is all there is to it. Simple. That's why some people say RSS stands for 'Really Simple Syndication.'
Some confusion has arisen because an RSS feed may be used in several ways. Calling it a 'newsfeed' is the first mistake, since RSS is used for much more than news. The most common situation is for the RSS items listed to have a short title, link to the original web page referred to, and a short description of the contents of that web page. But other people are including the complete contents of their resource directly in the RSS feed. So the feed may contain a graphic image of a cartoon, an entire post to a weblog (or blog), or the complete contents of a newsletter, rather than just a link back to those resources on a web site. Other sites leave out the description, and just list titles linked back to their website. And some versions of RSS allow you to leave out the title, so long as you have a description.
Speaking of 'versions' of RSS, that is the source of even more confusion. RSS began with version 0.90, and was called 'RDF Site Summary' -- the RDF refers to 'Resource Description Framework,' the method of labeling different parts of the file. This early version was updated and changed through various incarnations, including 0.91, 0.92, 0.93 and 0.94, and they began to call RSS 'Really Simple Syndication.' Then someone came along with a different format, slightly more complicated, and called it RSS version 1.0. Supporters of version 0.94 didn't like the implication that 1.0 was somehow an advance on 0.94 when in actuality it was a completely different format, so they came up with version 2.0 which was an improved version of 0.94, but still unlike 1.0. Rather than take sides in all this squabbling, someone else came up with their own version and called it Atom, to distance themselves from the RSS battles. Someone else developed Blogrolls that use OPML (Outline Processor Markup Language). Most of these formats are either loosely or strictly based on XML, the parent mark-up scheme.
None of this confusion of method and purpose has helped spread this really useful tool. Most RSS aggregators can read any of these formats, so the situation is not as hopeless as it may seem, but many folks still throw the whole thing out when they can't figure out exactly how it is supposed to work.
On http://www.SharedRSS.com/ we use version 1.0 because it is endorsed by W3C as being supportive of the 'semantic web.' For the casual user however, the version is really not important. SharedRSS is a simple site that performs a very powerful function ... it brings the benefits of RSS syndication to all those who publish websites, but who add new material too infrequently to warrant having their own RSS feed.
RSS Syndication was designed to help people find out about new content on the web, long before the search engines get around to finding it. It makes it easy for people to find out about new content that interests them, without having to return to the search engines and wade through all the material they have seen before. For sites with frequently changing content, it has worked well for them to create their own RSS feed and update it as new content is added to their website.
But what about all those sites that only add an occasional new article or story to their website, or who publish a newsletter once per month? Or those who just can't take the time to figure the ins and outs of formatting an RSS feed? An RSS feed that only gets updated once every few months is of little value; very few people will add it to their search list in their aggregator.
Shared RSS solves this problem by lumping together articles from different sites covering the same topic, and lets them announce the availability of their new material in a feed shared with others publishing on the same topic. This makes the feeds more useful to the consumer, so they are more likely to add the link to their aggregator. It benefits the publisher by making more people aware of their material as soon as it is put on-line.
About The Author
Andrew J. Morris is the owner and creator of SharedRSS -- a website that allows all website owners to syndicate their newly added material for FREE. http://www.sharedrss.com/
Saturday, April 18, 2009 | 0 Comments
A "Really Smart System" For Sending And Receiving Content Online
"RSS" stands for Really Simple Syndication. RSS is a standard for publishing regular updates to web-based content. Using this standard, web publishers provide updates, such as the latest news headlines, special announcements, press releases or weblog postings through their RSS content, which is also known as RSS "Feed".
What’s good about RSS is that anyone can start using it, whether a small business marketer or a large publisher.
Many Internet users are steadily switching to RSS reading applications (also known as aggregators) to collect and monitor their feeds in one place. RSS makes it possible for anyone to review large number of sites within a short period of time.
On the other hand, RSS allows publishers an instant widespread distribution of their content to consumers.
So you want to know who publishes RSS feeds?
Some of the biggest names on the Internet now offer content via RSS.
* Yahoo!
* MSN
* CNET
* BBC News Headlines
* ABC News
* CNN News
* Amazon.com
* E-week.com
* Plus...many, many more!
I guess you want to know the reason why I love RSS technology so much. I’m saying this as a reader and not as a publisher.
Let me count the reasons:
1. No spam
2. No ads
3. No more clutter in my inbox
4. No more mails taking up a huge amount of space in my inbox.
5. No more saving newsletters to "read later" that I know will just clutter up my inbox and probably never get read (or even get deleted)
6. No more emails loaded with huge images and HTML, which take ages to download and in the process clog up my connection making it ultra-slow.
7. Being able to go and catch up on my favorite newsletter or blogs anytime I feel like it - just like relaxing and reading a newspaper.
Can you add any more reasons here?
Maybe we can make this the longest "Why I Love RSS" list there is ;)
In addition to this, thousands of weblog authors publish feeds to keep themselves connected to their readers.
Weblogs, popularly known as blogs, are a driving force behind the recent surge in interest for RSS and syndicated content. Many experts believe that in the near future, the number of top-tier sites not syndicating any content will be in the minority.
However, if you're interested in collecting and browsing feeds, you have a multitude of choices.
There are primary two categories of feed reading applications: installable desktop programs and online aggregators. There are many desktop applications for Windows and Mac OS X system users, but two of the most popular ones are www.FeedDemon.com (Windows) and www.Ranchero.com/NetNewsWire (Mac OS X).
However, both require a small purchase price, but are at ahead in the class of user-friendliness. They come pre-loaded with dozens of feeds, so you can start exploring the syndication "universe" immediately.
Free readers like www.rssreader.com are also available online. Performing a simple search on google for “Free RSS Reader” will give you enough results.
However if you are publisher or a webmaster, searching for a service to publish your own feeds, then www.rapidfeeds.com is what I recommend. This service is a free and is just like a gold mine for both webmasters and publishers who want to quickly create, publish update and even track their RSS feeds from anywhere in the world.
However the site is still new and is in its growing stages (Beta Version) and is promising to add more new and interesting features in the near future. The site is completely professional and gives a valuable service for all. They even offer some basic RSS metrics like how many unique hits and click – throughs your feed is getting. As I learn from their FAQ page, they might introduce new useful features soon, but for a price.
Syed Ibrahim is an Internet marketing expert who provides people with better internet marketing solutions and services.
Thursday, April 16, 2009 | 0 Comments
See RSS Feeds from Your Website
RSS feeds have made it so convenient to gather current information. If you have an RSS Reader on your desktop, then from this one window you can get up-to-date information from any sources of your choice, such as:
1. Latest news from news agencies
2. Last articles published on ezines such as this one
3. New products at retail outlets
4. New movie reviews
5. Recent entries in blogs
The list is endless, but you get the idea.
How would you like to give this convenience to the visitors of your website? Your visitors can see RSS feeds with latest info right on your web page instead of going from site to site. And it is very easy to install.
Before you start I suggest that you see some sites which display RSS feeds just to get a feel of it. You can see your My.Yahoo page from where you can subscribe to any RSS feed you want. Or, if you like, you can see some popular feeds on my website:
http://sanjay-j.com/feed.html
Ok, let's get started with these easy steps.
1. Click open this page :
http://www.feedroll.com/rssviewer/
2. From "Step One" of this page select just one RSS feed out of the dropdown list.
3. Lower on the page in "Step Two" you will see some options. In these options you can fill in your values or leave them at default setting.
4. Click on update button.
5. A similar looking page opens. Down below on this page in "Step Three" there is a code which has to be installed on your website. Copy this code and paste it on a text editor. On right side of the page you can see how the feed will look on your page.
6. Go to step 2 and select some other RSS feeds. Repeat steps 3 to 5 and you will have a collection of codes to be installed on your website.
7. Select the web page where you want to install RSS feeds. I would suggest creating a new page exclusively for RSS feeds.
8. Decide the location on the web page for installing RSS feed. In the HTML code of the web page, paste one of the codes of RSS feeds at the location you have decided.
9. See how RSS feeds looks on your page. You will need to be connected to the net to see the feeds. You can make necessary corrections until you get the right appearance.
10. Add all other RSS feed codes below the first one. Separate each code with breaks. This will put all the feeds in one column.
So that's it. Simple steps. This will display some popular RSS feeds on your web site using Java. From this starting point you can think of installing other Java scripts or PHP scripts to display any RSS feeds of your choice.
Sanjay Johari regularly contrubutes articles for several ezines. See his site for useful information for benefit of small business owners.
http://sanjay-j.com
Thursday, April 16, 2009 | 0 Comments
5 Easy Ways To Use RSS On Your Site
You hear so much talk about RSS these days on the Internet and in the media. Everyone is acknowledging it's importance in boosting your site's presence on the web. Not to mention how it can increase your site's traffic and ranking. But what exactly is RSS and how can I actually use it on my site? Try these Five Easy Ways...
First, just what is RSS?
RSS stands for 'Really Simple Syndication'. Basically, RSS allows you to directly deliver your content to all interested parties... don't come to us; we will deliver the information to you or your website.
It syndicates your content. It lets you send updated headlines and brief summaries to your subscribers. In a nutshell; it's simply a more efficient way to get your content 'out there'.
Many people associate RSS with Blogs or Blogging because Blogs are usually written in XML or RSS format (code like html) so that these headlines and postings can be easily read and accessed.
RSS has been around for awhile but it really didn't catch on when users had to use RSS readers or aggregators but with the increasing popularity of MyYahoo, the Firefox Browser and Blogging...RSS is becoming: more popular, more accessible and more mainstream.
That's great --you say-- but just how do I put the stuff on my site!
If you're wondering how to actually use RSS and Benefit from it -- Try these Five Easy Ways...
1. How do I Get My OWN RSS Feed?
First, you need to get an RSS Feed for your site. There are several ways to do this. Let's just stick with the easiest. You can use a site like www.blogger.com and start a Blog on your site's topic or any topic that interests you.
Creating a blog with sites like Blogger (owned by Google) or Bloglines (recently acquired by Ask Jeeves) is quick, fast, and painless. Within minutes you can have your own blog up and running.
This Blog will also supply you with an RSS Feed that you can place on your site. Get a XML or RSS orange button and place it on your site. Link it to your RSS Feed url - this is your atom.xml link if you're using Blogger.
You can also use a MyYahoo button so visitors can add your feed to their MyYahoo. Each time a subscriber opens their MyYahoo site; your RSS Feed will be updated.
You can also add 'MyMsn' and 'Bloglines' buttons on your site. Plus others, give your visitors every opportunity to subscribe to your RSS Feed or Blog, and you will see a marked increase in visitors to your site.
Of course, you can also get your own blogging software and install it on your site. For those who want to choose this route, it might be helpful to check out this comprehensive comparison of the different blogging software here: http://www.asymptomatic.net/blogbreakdown.htm
2. How Do I Place Other RSS Feeds On My Site?
Have a cool RSS Feed from your favorite site and you want to place that Feed's content on your own site. How is it done?
It's a lot easier than you think!
There are several ways, but we'll again stick with the easiest way. If you just want to place headlines on your site - try a free service like www.feedburner.com and you will get a headline animator. This will display the RSS feed's headlines with links to the content.
If you want to place other content from a feed on your site - one of the easiest ways I found is to use this free site: www.bigbold.com/rssdigest/
This site will generate the source code (html or javascript) that you need to place into your webpages. It's good because it gives your code in several options: Javascript, Php file, and Iframe.
Keep in mind that Search Engines cannot or don't read javascript so if you want this daily updated content to be indexed please be aware of this.
Just take this code and add it your webpages where you want this content to go.
3. How do I place MSN Search Results Directly on My Site?
MSN has come out with their Beta Program using RSS in their search. You can now place RSS search results directly onto your website. It can enrich your site with daily updated content.
And it's quite simple to use; just add "&format=rss" at the end of the URL in your MSN search engine query. For example, to get an RSS Feed for 'tsunami relief' you would use this url: http://beta.search.msn.com/results.aspx?q=tsunami+relief&format=rss
4. How do I place Yahoo Results on my site?
In Yahoo the URL would be slightly different:
http://news.search.yahoo.com/news/rss?p=tsunami+relief&ei=UTF-8&fl=0&x=wrt
Of course, in both cases you can change 'tsunami+relief' with the keyword or phrase of your choice to suit your website's content.
Yahoo also has an RSS Search Directory here: http://news.yahoo.com/rss
5. What are Tags? How can I use them on my site?
Tags are more or less keywords for blogs and you should take advantage of them to bring targeted traffic to your site or blog.
Tags have hit the radar lately because Technorati, which indexes 4.5 million blogs, started sorting blog posts by using tags.
They have created a folksonomy, drawing tags from different sources, mainly Flickr.com which sorts or groups pictures and from del.icio.us -- where you create a tag when you bookmark a page.
Or if your blogging software supports categories; this will be recognized by Technorati as a tag.
If you want to create a 'tag' it's very simple; just place this code in your blog:
<*a href="http://technorati.com/tag/Computers" rel="tag">Computers<*/a>
(remove asterisks in actual code)
and you will have created a tag for computers.
Conclusion
You have just discovered five easy ways to put RSS on your website, but you have to implement this newly acquired information in order to see any results. You don't have to try all five --- just pick a few and put them on your site. Just take action and do it.
It's fairly easy, and you will see the benefits of RSS almost immediately. You will also see what all the fuss is about!
Copyright © 2005 - Bizwaremagic.com
This article may be freely distributed if this resource
box stays attached.
To Put RSS On Your Site Within Minutes - Visit This Link: RSS and Blogging Guide
Visit http://www.bizwaremagic.com for more simple solutions to your online marketing tasks.
Thursday, April 16, 2009 | 0 Comments
What is an RSS Aggregator or RSS Reader?
I keep hearing about RSS, XML and RSS feeds. I just barely have a clue what they are, but when people then start talking about RSS aggregators, what are they talking about and why would I want one? Do you use an aggregator, and if so, which one?
Ain't jargon fun? RSS is Really Simple Syndication and it's a simple data-only version of a Web page or, in the case of a weblog, Web site. Why is that interesting? Because it's then easy to write programs that track this XML formatted data stream and let you know when there's new material added to the site.
For example, if you were tracking the Ask Dave Taylor RSS data stream then when this article "went live" on my site, you'd receive notification and be able to read it within minutes of it arriving. Maybe not so critical for my tech and business Q&A, I admit, but I also track a number of different business newswires and was reading about the Proctor & Gamble acquisition of Gillette at least a day prior to my colleagues. How do I know that? Because they've told me that it was my own article on the subject (P&G buys Gillette for $57 billion, but how much is that in human terms?) that alerted them to the $54 billion transaction).
Helpful Hint: If you'd like to track an RSS feed and you have a browser with RSS support, you can click on the cute little XML button you find on many different Web sites. If your browser doesn't know what to do with that and instead shows you a cryptic page of text, you'll need an RSS reader or aggregator. Keep reading, but remember that you can also "right click" (or Ctrl-click for you Mac folks) and copy the link address to your buffer, then paste it into a 'subscribe' field in your reader.
The problem is, I don't want to check 100 RSS feeds any more than I want to visit 100 Web sites every day, and that's where aggregators come in. Whether they're standalone programs, plug-ins for your favorite Web browser or email program, or Web-based services, RSS aggregators remember your subscription list, check each site on a periodic basis, and alert you to any new articles that have been published.
If you're not thinking "wow, very cool" then you are spending too much time visiting Web sites! To scan the headlines of just a dozen sites on an hourly basis would probably be a full time job and if you need to keep abreast of your industry, as I do, then you wouldn't have any time to actually do anything, which would obviously be deleterious to your career long-term! :-)
So there are programs you can download that are RSS aggregators (or RSS readers, basically synonymous) for Windows, Mac and Linux/Unix systems. A few of the most popular are BlogExpress and FeedReader for Windows, NetNewsWire and NewsFire for Macintosh and Lifera for Linux.
Don't like having yet another application running? You can graft RSS capabilities into your Web browser (or run Firefox or Safari / Tiger, both of which have elegant built- in RSS capabilities) or your email program. Notable entries in this category are NewsGator (grafts into Microsoft Outlook on Windows), Pluck (grafts into Microsoft Internet Explorer on Windows) and Safari Menu (add-on for Apple's Safari browser that includes some RSS support).
Finally, you can subscribe to an RSS aggregator Web service which gives you a custom Web page that includes the newest information from your hand-picked RSS feeds. The highest profile solution to this is My Yahoo, which recently announced support for RSS feeds as additional personal home page information sources, though it just shows you a rolling 'latest five articles' from each source, so it doesn't work for me because I'd still be left trying to remember which I'd read or not. Other possibilities include AmphetaDesk, Bloglines, and Feedster.
Instead of those, however, I use a great Web-based product called NewsGator Online, which gives me the ability to track as many feeds as I like (fellow blogger Robert Scoble tracks over 1200 in his NewsGator Online account) along with the flexibility of keeping in sync at home, in my office and on the road.
Whichever solution you choose, I promise you that once you start traveling down the road of RSS feeds and RSS aggregators, you won't turn back. In fact, you'll find that every time you go to a Web site that you like, you'll immediately start hunting for the "syndicate" or "rss" or "xml" button. i certainly do, and I'm more plugged in now than I could ever have been in the past.
It's a rolling sea of information out there, and an RSS aggregator gives you a sail and GPS navigation system. It might just save your life out there!
Dave Taylor has been involved with the blogging community for years and is widely respected as an expert on business blogging, among other areas.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009 | 0 Comments
How RSS Advertising Can Help Business Gain A Higher ROI
I recently read the case study conducted by Pheedo, an advertising company on the use of RSS Feeds advertising versus email advertising.
The difference in results were staggering.
Pheedo ran the campaign for 6 weeks and from their results, RSS feeds outperformed the best click through rate in email by over 26% as compared to the industry average of 8.7%.
Surprised? Let's investigate the benefits of RSS advertising versus email ads.
RSS advertising has a number of 'superior' advantages compared to email ads:
1. RSS feeds does not face a delivery issue in an anti-SPAM environment that is being filled with filters, anti-virus software or whatever program that is put in place by the user to block SPAM and unwanted emails.
2. RSS feeds cost ZERO to track. With a burned feed, you can easily track how many people are subscribing to your feed.
With email, if you want to track how many of your mails were delivered, you would have to pay for the additional services.
A simple mathematical illustration can prove this:
Let's say Cost per 1,000 impressions = $50
And you want to do 10,000 impressions per week.
So the cost would be = $50 x 10 = $500 per week.
With Email Advertising, you would need to include email monitoring delivery charges.
So your total cost would be $500 + X per week
where X is the additonal costs for email monitoring delivery
So your advertising costs go up. Mutiply the above figure with 48 weeks (1 year) and you can see how costly it is to run email advertising campaigns.
With RSS Advertising, there is ZERO monitory delivery charges.
You maximise every penny from your advertising dollar, and the costs go down!
3. RSS feeds is 100% Opt-in. We're talking about readers who know what they want and educated enough to know how to subscribe to feeds, either with desktop readers or through the use of some online newsreader such as Bloglines, MyYahoo and so on.
Yes, there is also 'opt-in' email. But then again, opt-in email is getting less effective because of:
a) constant bombardment of emails from other marketers and advertisers, making the subscribers 'numb' to advertising message
b) keywords that trigger off SPAM filter, causing failed delivery message
RSS feeds do not face these two problems. RSS feeds has a 100% delivery rate and has no SPAM issue as it is a feed, not email.
It will be interesting to see the continued developments in the use of RSS feeds for advertising.
Brandon http://www.marketing-rampage-with-blogs-and-rss.com
Author of Multimedia E-book, "Marketing Rampage With Blogs And RSS". Unleash the power of blogs and rss. Get more free targeted traffic, leads and subscribers with RSS Feeds. List in Google and Yahoo for FREE and save $299. Dominate niche markets with RSS Feeds.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009 | 0 Comments
How Can RSS Feeds Help Your Online Business?
So who should I use RSS Feeds? How can it help with my online business?
1. RSS Feeds allow you to deliver your newsletter/message directly to the desktop of your subscribers and readers, BYPASSING email. As you might have read or heard, email is not getting through to a lot of people, especially now with CAN SPAM law in place, ISPs are filtering a lot of emails with certain subject lines in them.
Imagine if you have a 10,000 list and 20% of your emails doesn't get through.
That means 2,000 mails are not being delivered.
How much sales are you losing from this alone?
It is also costly to hire services that help you do the monitoring and ensure your autoresponders/emails get through.
Your readers and subscribers themselves are getting numb to the constant bombardment of emails from other parties, bear in mind they are not just subscribing to your newsletter.
With RSS Feeds, you can get your readers to subscribe to your news feed using a newsreader software or online web service for reading rss feeds).
This way you can bypass all the email SPAM and reach 100% your readers.
And with some good headlines, you can bet your message gets read.
2. Get your site listed by YAHOO within 24 hours and save $299
With RSS Feeds, you can get your site listed in Yahoo within 24 hours and save $299. Yahoo is currently building an RSS directory and as such has inadvertently opened a "back door", allowing people to list their website with RSS feeds.
This secret is revealed in my multimedia ebook, with video tutorials showing you how to do it. Each day more people are discovering this secret, and I'm not sure when Yahoo will pull the plug.
3. Dominate niche market with RSS feeds
You can create multiple RSS feeds centered around targeted keywords and submit them to RSS directories. There are people who are actually looking for good content online and wants to read and subscribe to news feeds.
They might be searching for news on the keyword "cooking" for example. When someone performs a keyword search and you have your feeds built around that keyword, it will turn up and you get to have more subscribers when they subscribe to your news feeds.
4. More subscribers, more leads, more sales.
RSS feeds give you a wider reach and gain more subscribers you otherwise would not have gotten.
More subscribers mean more leads, and more sales!
RSS allows your newsletter, messages, ads to be syndicated all over the web, giving you a wider reach you otherwise would not have.
Imagine a giant octopus with unlimited tentacles stretching all over the sea searching, looking...well, with RSS feeds, basically you're doint the same thing.
You have to submit your rss feeds though, to the relevant directories, otherwise noboby knows about it.
5. Podcasting
Podcast is the latest application of RSS feeds. Have you heard of webcast?
With Webcast, you have to go to the website where the audio file (mp3 file) is stored.
Podcast take it one step further. It allows you to syndicate your mp3 audio files (such as a web cast or tele-seminar) all over the web and even allows you to download to Apple Ipod.
Your potential customer and readers can listen to your message even without being at the PC. Isn't that fantastic?
Ride the RSS Wave TODAY! Learn more at
www.marketing-rampage-with-blogs-and-rss.com
Brandon is Author of Multimedia Ebook "Marketing Rampage with Blogs and RSS". Unleash the power of blogs and rss feeds to drive more FREE targeted traffic, gain more leads and sales. List in Google and Yahoo for Free and save $299. Dominate niche markets with RSS Feeds
brandon @ brandon-hong.com
http://www.Marketing-Rampage-With-Blogs-And-Rss.com
http://www.brandon-hong.com
Wednesday, April 15, 2009 | 0 Comments
What Is The Orange "XML" or "RSS" Icon I See More and More On Web Sites?
This question does not have a one sentence answer! If I just said that one uses this icon to get a site's RSS feed, you still won't understand. So let's try and answer you in such a way that it all makes sense to you and, more importantly, that you learn how to benefit from it.
Let's say that you like my web site very much and you would like to read new content as I add it. At this stage there is no way of informing you when I've added a new page except for notifying you by email. This assumes that you've provided me with your e-mail address - which most people are hesitant to do any way. The other way is for you to bookmark my site - but how many times do people really go back to a site?
What if I told you that you could have a little "window" (called a reader or an aggregator) on your monitor and that, each time I updated my site, you are automatically informed about it. How, you may ask? A headline (called a news feed) and a short summary to inform/tease you is squirted to your reader. If the teaser interests you, all you need to do is follow the hyperlink that will take you to that page on my web site where you can read it all. If you're not interested, you simply delete the headline. The process is repeated each time I add new content.
You can of course subscribe to as many feeds as you want to - from current affairs to people's personal blogs (a blog is short for web log which is a diary or a journal on the internet).
So, what must you do to set it up and how much is it going to cost?
Let's answer the second question first: Setting it up is FREE - it will cost you nothing.
This is how to setup a reader or an aggregator on a Windows system:
Download Microsoft's .NET framework here:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=262D25E3-F589-4842-8157-034D1E7CF3A3&displaylang=en"
Install this on you system.
Download RSSReader from here:
http://www.rssreader.com/
Install this on you system.
You are now ready to add your first feed.
As an example I'll walk you through the process of adding my site http://www.perfect-party-ideas.com 's XML feed. Navigate to the site. On the home page you will see the orange XML icon. Right-click the XML icon and then click the "Copy Shortcut" option.
Open the RSSReader and click on the green "+ Add" icon in the top left hand corner. A form opens up that prompts you to enter the URL of the feed. Just paste the URL here (ctrl-v). Well done - you've just added your very first RSS feed.
Let's test if it is working. Click the "Get" icon which is to the left of the "+Add" icon. You should see a number of feeds arriving in your reader. Simply double-click the ones you are interested in to read the summary. Click the "Read more" or "Open in a Browser" links if you want to read the whole article.
Was it that difficult? No, I agree, it's fairly straight forward.
Now you are ready to sign up for more feeds. Why not sign up for my blog's feed as well? I use my blog to document the process of setting up my web site. There I share my ideas, failures, frustrations, doubts, successes, and articles that have I found useful. And, B.t.w. I also tell you how to make money from your web site.
If you're interested in following the exciting journey, just copy and paste this URL exactly as you did with the previous one.
http://perfect-party-ideas.blogspot.com/atom.xml
Congratulations - you have entered the exciting world of RSS!
Anne-Marie Killer is a mother of two teenagers and a toddler. She is the webmaster and owner of Perfect Party Ideas Read her blog where she documents the process of setting up http://www.perfect-party-ideas.com/
Tuesday, April 14, 2009 | 0 Comments
10 Reasons to Put RSS on Your Site!
RSS and Blogs are the topics of the moment. Seems
like everyone is talking about it. Granted, there
is too much hype about RSS and Blogs.
But where there's hype - there's interest!
And with good reason - RSS is posed to be the
break out technology of 2005. Those who don't take
full advantage of it will be left behind.
If you need convincing - here are 10 reasons
why you should put RSS on your site:
1. It's easy and fast! Not to mention Free! You
can use a free service like eBlogger and publish
your Blog and RSS feed within minutes. You can even
place or publish your Blog/RSS Feed on your own site
without knowing 'html' or 'xml'. It's all done for you!
Repeat - it's simple to use and very convenient.
Publishing your blog is only a few clicks away.
(If you need help - just use the link at the end of
this article.)
2. Syndicate Your Content. RSS stands for 'really
simple syndication' and it's just another way of
passing along your information. With the popularity
of 'MyYahoo' and the 'Firefox' browser (which has a
built-in RSS feed reader) - syndicating your
content has gotten even simpler.
The next version of Windows is reportly scheduled
to have a RSS feature. If this happens - RSS will
explode.
3. Get Your Content Indexed. Using blogs to publish
your content is a neat way of side stepping the regular
indexing procedure. It gets your content indexed very
quickly in most of the search engines.
Search Engines are constantly on the lookout for
'fresh content' - these 'link rich' blogs are a good
source of this content. Because blogs are on specific
topics - they have a concentrated source of good
quality informational material to serve up!
4. Instant Contact. Blogs give you instant contact
with your readers or viewers. We live in an 'instant'
society - we want everything five minutes ago. Blogs
provide this instant gratification. Readers or viewers
using MyYahoo have an instant link to your information
or postings.
RSS Feeds will instantly spread your information to
all interested parties - bringing in targeted traffic.
5. Building Your List. People who pick up your RSS
feed or add you to their MyYahoo site - become your
subscribers. You are really building your contact list.
Have a popular blog or RSS Feed and you can build a
large targeted contact list very quickly.
It might not replace your old opt-in email list - but
it can be a lucrative addition to it! Take advantage of
all those targeted contacts.
6. Link Building. Blogs are link heavens! Build your
links thru blogs. All these links will boost your link
popularity and increase your search engine rankings.
Plus, by giving viewers/readers a way of adding your
RSS Feed creates targeted links to your site. This
reason alone is why your site should have RSS!
7. Viewer/Subscriber Feedback. Instant feedback from
your subscribers or viewers is easy with blogs. Creating
trust and credibility is so much easier when there is
immediate communication between the two parties.
8. Keyword Content Building. Blogs are especially
good for building 'keyword targeted content' for your
site. All these links will boost your keyword rankings
in the search engines. Google places a high value on
'anchor text' and blogs are a good place to put all
those links.
You can also start different blogs targeted at
'specific related keywords' covering the major topics
of your site. Again, search engines love related
keyword linking so you can boost your site's rankings
by using blogs.
9. Monetize Your Content. Blogs are an excellent way
of monetizing your content. Blog sites like Eblogger
(owned by Google) even encourages you to use the
'adsense code' in your blogs. If you have a
popular blog - this may bring in extra income.
Plus, publishing your ezine or newsletter in a blog
can bring in revenue for months if not years to come.
All those affiliate links and product promotions
get indexed by the search engines and become
accessible to a wider audience, i.e. market.
10. Because Everyone Else is Doing It! Might sound
a bit 'Jonesish' but you do have to keep up with
what other web sites are doing. To remain competitive -
you MUST put RSS on your site.
Sites without the 'AddtoMyYahoo' link or the 'xml'
button will be the exception rather than the rule
in just a few years - if not months. It's simply
another way of getting your information 'out there'.
It's an opportunity and advantage that you cannot
afford to miss.
Proceed without RSS at your own risk!
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To add RSS to your Site within minutes - check out this simple RSS Report and Guide Copyright © 2004-5 Titus Hoskins of bizwaremagic.com. This article may be freely distributed if this resource box stays attached. Visit http://www.bizwaremagic.com for more simple solutions to your online marketing tasks.
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Tuesday, April 14, 2009 | 0 Comments