RSS is a sneaky way for site visitors to consume content without notifying the website’s creator. They leave no digital footprints. If you have a website, you’ll have a large group of mysterious people following you.
I guarantee it.
They follow you through RSS.
“RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication.”
“It’s a web feed that lets people or apps automatically receive updates from a website, such as new blog posts, without visiting the site manually. RSS readers collect those updates in one place.”
No signups are required to get RSS content. And more and more fans are going this old-school way to bypass subscriptions, pop-ups, and ad content on websites.
Why? Who? How much bigger is this secret ‘other’ audience?
Hang on a second; I’ll answer those questions shortly, but let’s first talk about RSS, since not everyone knows their site has one. They also don’t know it’s leaking free content onto the web.
RSS isn’t difficult to access. All sites have one available for reading. It comes with them out of the box.
You need to locate its URL and have an RSS reader like Feedly display it. That’s it.
Why would anyone want to read the RSS file anyway? Why use it instead of visiting the site and reading content on the HTML pages?
Ahh. Now, this is what it all comes down to. Read carefully.
RSS IS LAUNDERED TEXT.
IT’S AD-FREE. POP-UP FREE. SUBSCRIPTION FREE. AUTOMATIC and ANONYMOUS!
Yes! RSS doesn’t require subscribers to give up their email addresses and personal details. Another benefit for readers is simplicity. The content is free of messy advertising and overblown page formatting. This cleans up the page, making it tidier to read on a phone screen.
If you’re a content reader, this is lovely to know, but it makes it challenging for content authors. They can’t rely on any razzle-dazzle formatting to connect with readers. It’s gone.
Let’s say you’re a content creator who indents paragraphs and centralises headings. They disappear when viewed in RSS.
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| RSS LOGO |
Paywalls go away.
Colour-coded tables are out. Background images/patterns are gone.
Scrolling texts, nada. Slide shows, deleted.
Justified text in a hoity-toity font is reduced to simple Times New Roman. It becomes black text on a light background. All the hard work an author puts into formatting prettiness into their pages vanishes in RSS.
Also, tracking a bunch of unknown fans who are secretly subscribing to your content is nearly impossible. The when, where and who of traffic stats doesn’t exist.
That raises brand new questions for creators of content:
- What does my site look like in RSS?
- How many people are subscribing to my RSS feed?
- Monetizing? Can it happen in RSS?
CAN I FIND OUT WHO’S SUBSCRIBING TO MY RSS?
Mostly no. You can see the download number in the site’s statistics in Cpanel. However, you won’t find a list of email addresses or a country of origin with it. You won’t know when they read your content or how long they stayed on a page.
Sneaky, eh?
You could disable your RSS feed and force visitors to return to the site. I suspect that if you did that, most of your visitors would abandon your site in favour of someone else’s feed.
HOW DOES MY SITE LOOK IN RSS?
To see how your page looks in RSS, put your RSS URL into that app. View it on a laptop, phone, or tablet to get an accurate representation of your content across all devices. You’ll be surprised by how unsophisticated the RSS file is and how important good writing is for making it read well (it might not even display photos or videos).
Creating great content for an unspecified RSS audience has never been more challenging. It must be strong and succinct. The real conundrum is converting a band of anonymous subscribers into paying customers.
If you know the answer to this question, I’m all ears.
I don’t profess to know all there is to know about RSS. I’m but a humble writer of dark fiction. When I found out that my RSS downloads far exceeded the number of my official subscribers, I had to look further.
I hope my recent discovery now helps you, too.
–Michael (Dark Fiction. Author of SEETHINGS (the first book), free for a limited time)
SEETHINGS promises a gripping psychological thriller that blends murder, passion, and secrets of a sexless marriage. Forman’s vivid prose draws readers into a world where lightning illuminates the skies and hidden truths. As the storm clouds gather, Mitchell’s journey promises to unravel more than just the mystery of the murders.
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Discover more from Michael Forman – Author of Dark Fiction & Drama
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