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Title: The 7-Step RSS Marketing Plan
Author: Rok Hrastnik
Article:
Copyright 2005 Rok Hrastnik
If you're wondering how to get started with RSS marketing,
here's a basic 7-step plan that should provide some needed
guidance. Use these steps as your personal RSS marketing
checklist to get your started and help you see whether you're on
the right track.
1. START USING RSS AS AN END-USER
The first step to getting started with RSS marketing/publishing
is getting your own RSS aggregator, subscribing to other RSS
feeds and just seeing and understanding how it all works.
There's a variety of RSS aggregators to choose from. Just a
small sample:
a) Web-based RSS aggregators (websites): http://my.yahoo.com,
http://www.pluck.com, http://www.newsgator.com,
http://www.bloglines.com
b) Desktop RSS aggregators (software): http://www.awasu.com,
http://www.bradsoft.com/feeddemon/,
http://www.stevenwood.org/stories/2003/06/08/voxLite.htm
c) Integrated RSS aggregators (integrate with IE or Microsoft
Outlook): http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/ (browser with
integrated RSS features), http://www.newsgator.com,
http://www.pluck.com, http://www.attensa.com/index.php?ys=1
2. PLAN YOUR RSS FEEDS
Planning your RSS feeds might be the most important thing you do
about RSS. You most certainly need an RSS feed for your e-zine,
your news section, your articles etc.
But how you will package these, what others you might want to
offer and other important issues, are much more complex than we
can cover in this space. A precise overview of all of the
opportunities is available in the "Unleash the Marketing and
Publishing Power of RSS" e-book at
http://rss.marketingstudies.net?src=sa13
You might also want to do follow-up (autoresponder) RSS feeds,
feeds for your affiliates, feeds for your employees or business
partners, feeds for the media, and so on.
3. CREATE A LIST OF RSS MARKETING/PUBLISHING REQUIREMENTS
Then create a list of requirements for the RSS
marketing/publishing solution you will be getting to publish
your feeds. The list should answer the basic questions, such as:
a) Do you want to integrate RSS publishing with your existing
content management system?
b) What RSS metrics you'll want to watch? For example, are you
satisfied with just a rough idea of how many people are reading
your RSS feed, or are you interested in more precise subscriber
counts, clicks and even individual content item popularity?
c) Do you need feed personalization, such as personalizing your
RSS content with the receipient's name and other details?
d) Do you want to provide your subscribers with the ability to
precisely select the content they want to receive in your RSS
feed (customization), such as by content topic, keywords,
authors and so on?
e) Do you want the RSS feeds to be hosted on your own server?
f) Do you need the ability to target promotional messages or
other content to your individual RSS feed subscribers, for
example based on their previous clicks and reading habits, or
even their subscription data?
g) What's your budget?
h) Etc.
More information on all the different possibilities provided by
RSS is available in the free Business Case for RSS report at
http://rssdiary.marketingstudies.net/case/index.html?src=sa13
4. CHOOSE AN RSS PUBLISHING TOOL AND CREATE YOUR FIRST FEED
After you've prepared a list of requirements you can start
searching for the appropriate tool. These come in a few general
categories:
a) Desktop feed generation tools Desktop software you can use to
inexpensively, quickly and easily generate RSS feeds, but
doesn't allow for more advanced features such as content
targeting. The market leader in this category is
http://www.feedforall.com.
b) Hosted online RSS publishing solutions If you don't want to
be bothered with a desktop tool and having to constantly upload
your RSS feeds to your server, you could try a basic hosted
online RSS publishing solution, such as
http://www.myrsscreator.com. Using their simple service you
don't even need your own website to publish via RSS. Another
good choice, especially if you're in PR, is
http://www.press-feed.com/
c) Advanced RSS marketing solutions These will cover more
advanced RSS marketing capabilities, such as metrics, scheduled
autoresponder messages, database building capabilities and
similar. The strongest contenders in this market are
http://www.simplefeed.com, http://www.nooked.com,
http://myst-technology.com and some other strong players as
well. Solutions aimed especially at smaller companies include
http://www.rssautopublisher.com and
http://www.market-soft.com/bypass/
d) Other options There are many other options as well, one for
example being using your existing content management system to
publish RSS feeds, or using a blog publishing solution such as
http://www.movabletype.com
5. PROMOTE YOUR RSS FEEDS THROUGH YOUR OWN CHANNELS
a) Create an RSS presentation page, on which you explain: what
RSS is; how the visitor will benefit from using RSS; where they
can get a free RSS aggregator (recommend one yourself!); how
they can subscribe to your RSS feeds; and why they should
subscribe to your own RSS feeds.
Then, on this same page, include the links to all of your RSS
feeds. In addition to the standard orange RSS button, also
include direct links for subscriptions via MyYahoo! (get it here
http://my.yahoo.com/s/button.html) and other relevant services,
such as Bloglines (http://www.bloglines.com).
b) Now promote this RSS presentation page as much as you can
using all of your available channels.
c) Promote your RSS feeds directly below your e-zine
subscription box, and always "above the fold". Promote your RSS
presentation page (telling your visitors that's where they can
subscribe to your feeds) on the most prominent locations of your
site.
d) If you're publishing more than one RSS feed, but rather a
couple of focused topic feeds, promote each of them next to
their topics on the site.
e) Promote your RSS feeds in all of your e-mail messages and
e-zine issues.
f) As for the content, don't just say "Subscribe to receive news
from my site", but rather prepare compelling copy to
specifically show your visitors why they need to subscribe to
your content in the first place and why they should subscribe
specifically to your RSS feeds.
e) Enable Auto-discovery Just include the following piece of
HTML code in the <head> section of your webpages and you'll be
all set: <link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml"
title="RSS" href="ENTER_RSS_URL">
6. PROMOTE YOUR RSS FEEDS THROUGH EXTERNAL CHANNELS
a) Submit your feeds to the appropriate search engines and
directories. A good list can be found here:
http://www.masternewmedia.org/rss/top55/
b) Ping the RSS aggregation sites each time you update your
online content, letting them know that new content is available
to be indexed. You can use this free service:
http://pingomatic.com
7. OTHER KEY RSS ACTIVITIES
a) Measure and optimize your feeds
b) Syndicate your feed content to other web media
c) Display third-party RSS feeds on your site
About the author:
Immediately find out how you can power your online business with
RSS and instantly increase your internet success. Request the
free 28-page Business Case for RSS report, with easy-to-follow
instructions, examples and advice on how to get the most out of
RSS in the shortest possible time. Get the free download here:
http://rssdiary.marketingstudies.net/case/index.html?src=sa13
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