What Are RSS Feeds?
RSS (or Really Simple Syndication) is a family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated web pages, such as blog entries, news headlines, audio, and video; in a standardised format. An RSS document (which is called a “feed”, “web feed”, or “channel”) includes full or summarised text, plus metadata such as publishing dates, title, description and authorship. Web feeds benefit their publishers by letting them syndicate content automatically. They benefit readers who want to subscribe to timely updates from favored websites or to aggregate feeds from many sites into one place. RSS feeds can be read using software called an “RSS reader”, “feed reader”, or “aggregator”, which can be web-based, desktop-based, or mobile-device-based. A standardised XML file format allows the information to be published once and viewed by many different programs.
The user subscribes to a feed by entering into the reader the feed’s URI or by clicking an RSS icon in a web browser that initiates the subscription process.
The RSS reader checks the user’s subscribed feeds regularly for new work, downloads any updates that it finds, and provides a user interface to monitor and read the feeds.
Practicle applications of RSS Feeds
There are an endless number of practicle uses for rss feeds, but there are 3 main reasons why every website should make use of them.
- SEO Search Engine Optimisation benefits by having udated fresh content on your website
- Linking with your social networking platforms including Twitter and Facebook
- Giving your readers a reason to come back to your website often.
Let’s look at these in more detail:
SEO Advantages gained with RSS Feeds
Search engines are putting an ever increasing emphasis on new fresh content. Having a reed reader on your website means that everytime the feed publisher updates the feed, your site will have some fresh content to display.
Social Networking Feeds
Follow us on Twitter, and Follow us on Facebook have become part of our everyday language, so much so that visitors to a website expect to see these phrases.
Repeat Customers
Another obvious statement is you want customers to come back to your website, often and stay on it for a while. Using RSS Feeds can supply visitors with information that they can come back to your site repeatedly.
