The preview feed

I think most bloggers started this way with their feed. What’s the point of putting ads on your website and publishing your content in a different place? What’s the point of having 5,000 readers if they all can read my content ads-free? Well, I’m sure you all read other blogs and even yourself get frustrated when you can only read a preview of an article in your favorite news reader. You don’t feel like visiting the website just to read a single article, so what’s the point of subscribing if you still have to visit the damn website? My usual reaction is simply to unsubscribe.

If myself, as a reader, unsubscribe from “preview” feeds, I’m sure you do and I’m also pretty sure that’s what your readers do! That is one of the main reason some blogs aren’t able to increase their number of subscribers. You might gain 10 readers a day, but there’s a strong possibility you’re also loosing 10 readers every day.

So, what do I do?

You should publish your full articles into your feeds. You can also place some ads into your feed if you really want to maximize your profits: it’s something we’ll see more often in the coming years. I personally don’t like to put ads in RSS feeds but this really is a personal decision and I don’t think this would impact the number of subscribers a lot. The main reason why you want a full feed is to keep your subscribers. You might not get a buck from your RSS feed, but loyal readers will comment on your blog often and also talk about you on other websites. What you really want to do is getting loyal readers in order to make long-term gains.

Thinking short-term is usually killing a business. Long-term thinking gives you less money at first, but it’s definitely worth it in the long run. I personnaly think full and ads-free RSS feeds are the way to go. You just have to make sure you write good enough content so that people feel the need to comment or visit your website for whatever other reason.