RSS Feed Explained

August 10th, 2008

In today’s Web 2.0 online environment, it’s almost impossible to land on a blog, newsletter or current website without seeing an invitation to get the webmaster’s information via RSS.

If you are one of the thousands of new Internet Marketers just dipping their toes in the fast-paced waters of the Internet, you might not understand the valuable uses for RSS (Really Simple Syndicaton) and how syndication can improve your sales and drive traffic to your offers. Believe me, you are not alone.

Every new process, or revamped old process, develops it own set of terminology and buzz words, so let’s take a look at some of the RSS terminology first.

• Syndication:

Syndication, according to Wikipedia, means that you allow your website, or a portion of it, to be available for other sites to use. This usually means “…making web feeds available from your site, or blog, in order to provide other people with a summary of your website’s recently added content (for example, the latest news or forum posts).”

Different types of syndicated content can be found all over the Web, including newspapers, commercial websites, blogs or product offers from Internet Marketers. It has become a free and easy form of advertisement that increases targeted traffic and expands your site’s exposure across normally unreachable online platforms.

Web syndication by online marketers is removing the hesitancy web surfers have with providing personal information to invisible marketers, like name and email address for signing up to receive a newsletter. Those surfers expecting to subscribe to an RSS feed instead are growing in numbers and will soon be in the majority. Don’t ignore them!

RSS and Atom are the two main syndication formats.

• RSS Feed:

To start with, an RSS feed notifies you when a web site or blog you are interested in has been updated. There are two kinds of RSS feeds, static and dynamic.

When you see the latest scores for your favorite team or are continually checking for bargain airline tickets for your vacation to Disney World, that information would be a static feed from a sports news media or an airline/ticket site.

Info from a dynamic feed would depend on your search terms to provide specific information to add to your data stream. A dynamic feed would be one from a website you are watching for new content or notices abou new products. It would give you notice of the change on the website.

• Feed Reader or News Aggregator:

Those two terms are merely names for the software that allows you to get the RSS feeds from websites or blogs that interest you and have it displayed so you can read it and use the information the way you want to use it.

At the moment I use Googe Feedreader and you can find an article about how to use it here but you can find 12 or 15 feed reader options at: http://blogspace.com/rss/readers.

• The Big Question…What is RSS?

RSS, or Really Simple Syndication, is a format for delivering regularly changing web content and is making it easier for you to stay informed by receiving the lastest content from your sites of interest. You don’t have to visit each site individually and do not have to join each site’s newsletter by providing your private information.

More than several big name sites, like Yahoo News, the BBC News in the UK, the US government and more newspapers and other news media than you can shake a stick at, are providing free RSS news feeds for delivery to anyone. They are not doing that for no reason, but because they recognize the extended reach their message will have and the benefits that reach will return to them. Copy success!

Internet Marketers are starting to add an RSS feed to their websites and blogs. Look for a button or link that says “XML,” “RSS” or an invitation to “Syndicate This Site” if you want to start receiving their information via an RSS news feed.

Almost any information can be used to publicize updates to your website or blog… photos, summaries of your latest update or simply the title of your update with a link back to the original source.

RSS benefits both the readers and the publishers of the feed. When you update your blog post, add new content to your website or want to announce a new sales price or special bonus for your readers, they all wil know immediately about the change or special offer and can decide if they want to visit your site or not.

Internet Marketers can reach a much wider audience for their products or services because web browsers are becoming much more likely to subscribe to an RSS feed and avoid the email clutter that clogs their inbox after subscribing to a few newsletters.

All the benefits of RSS feeds are not restricted to your subscribers, but have some powerful results when used as a marketing tool. When you use an RSS feed to market your products, you are attracting visitors and customers who are interested in your products and want to receive your information. This Win-Win process protects you from a spamming accusation.

The new techniques and requirements of using RSS to get your message circulating may still intimidate or confuse some of your customers. It is a good idea, for customer service, to offer both the RSS feed and emai notification of your website, blog or product updates. You do not want to immediately exclude a set of customers who prefer one method over the other, regardless of the reason.

As a tool to increase targeted and focused traffic to your site, RSS feeds work great for this top-of-the-list marketing need. If the content update interests your reader, many will want to read the complete story on your website and will click the link to do just that. When that happens, they arrive at your website already interested in your product… marketing gold!

Getting comfortable with this vibrant and ever-changing Web 2.0 tool will expand your reach and increase your conversions. More and more people are switching to RSS feeds everyday to make their lives less cluttered and to put the information they receive in their own hands and not those of random marketers. Don’t ignore this grass roots movement… join it!

Why not try it out by subscribing to my feed?

Related Article: Catch Up on Your Favourite Blogs in One Place

If you would like to be notified the next time I make a post, sign up for Email Alerts or subscribe to the RSS feed. Many thanks for reading

Posted in Blogging, Web 2.0 | 15 Comments »

Could You Save Some Money on Your Aweber Subscription?

August 5th, 2008

I’ve been meaning to post this little bit of information for a while now, but it keeps getting pushed down my list of blog topics…..

Did you know that you could be paying more for your Aweber subscription than you need to?

Did you know that when people unsubscribe from your list(s), Aweber DOES NOT remove them?

Did you know that undeliverable emails - e.g. perhaps someone subscribed and changed their email address - are not automatically removed from your list of subscribers?

Yes, of course, when you send out a broadcast or add an autoresponder message to Aweber, those who have unsubscribed or who have an undeliverable email address are not included in the `send out’ but THEY ARE STILL INCLUDED in your list of subscribers as far as Aweber’s billing is concerned.

Take a look……

You might have 513 subscribers, but 15 have unsubscribed, leaving you with 498 subscribers, but you won’t be paying $19 a month…. no, you will be paying an extra $10…. those 15 unsubscribes are still attributed to your account and therefore your bill, even though they unsubscribed and you can’t send emails to them.

What about if you know you have 5,050 subscribers, but you know that over the past few months, 50 of those on your list have become undeliverable? You will still be paying $69 instead of $49, that’s an extra $20 for having people on your list with undeliverable email addresses.

So here’s where you need to do a bit of housekeeping in your Aweber account - you need to regularly spring clean your lists and rid yourself of all those people that unsubscribe or become `undeliverable’. And here’s how you can do it…

1) Login to your account and choose which list you are going to start with from the drop down menu (if you only have one or two lists, this won’t take too long, but if you have loads, it could take a little while)

Click on the Leads tab

2) Select Unsubscribed Leads from the drop-down menu (it’s the one at the very bottom!)

3) You’ll see a bit of whirring going on and then your unsubscribed details will appear

Simply check the Erase box to check all the boxes, then click Save - that’s it… GONE!

If you’ve got a quite a few unsubscribes that have built up over time, you may have a number of pages with details to erase.

4) To do the same for the undeliverable leads, go back to point 2) and select Undeliverable Leads from the drop down menu and repeat the same process

If you have loads of lists, or indeed a large amount of subscribers and have built up a mass of unsubscribes and undeliverables over a long period of time, an alternative method is to telephone Aweber, or contact their support desk and ask them to remove all your unsubscribes and undeliverables.

Et voila… I hope you’ve saved yourself a bit of cash, and if not, well… it’s something to keep an eye on as you grow your lists.

Edit 21st Aug 2008: To answer the question that John asked in the comments section below:

I contacted Aweber and asked them if they charged on a monthly average subscriber count or the number on a cut-off date?

Their reply was that they billed retroactively (after the fact), on the number of leads in your account when you reach the cut-off number.

Aweber: Backstage, Behind The Scenes

Posted in General, Internet Marketing, List Building | 10 Comments »

Is The Bar Now Raised on Private Label Rights?

August 1st, 2008

I dont believe it….. has anyone noticed that in the past few weeks launches for decent products have suddenly become like waiting for a bus? You stand around waiting for one for ages and then all of a sudden two or three come along at once!

What to do? I mean, no-one wants to bombard their subscribers with offer after offer, well at least I certainly don’t - but at the same time I don’t want my subscribers emailing me saying “Paula, how come you didn’t tell us about that new blah blah product that was released with the great “Fast Action” bonus? We’ve missed it now and it’s all your fault, I’m never going to open another email from you again!”

OK, so maybe that’s a bit of an over-exaggeration there, but I do like to keep my subscribers up to date with new stuff on the market that’s well worth a look at.

In the past two weeks, I’ve had eight products sent to me to have a good old rummage around and out of all of them, only three were something that I thought you’d be missing out on if I didn’t tell you about them.

You all know about Omar Martin’s KASP (see review here), which I’ve been getting some great feedback for. Then there’s another really excellent product that came in for review late the other night, but I’m putting that one on hold temporarily, as I really feel it’s stretching things doing two reviews in a week.

The third product that I’ve been eagerly anticpating the launch of is PLR Monthly - the new Membership PLR site by Dave (Slick) Nicholson and Daniel Sumner. And yours truly’s been having a good old nosey around!

Launch: 1st August, 2008 7 PM UK time / 2 pm EST

Now I wasn’t quite sure what to expect when asked to take a look at this, as I know there are a lot of PLR Membership sites out there all vying for the same business. Blimey, was I surprised!

This is no ordinary PLR site, no sir-eeeeee.. PLR Monthly gives you so much more

What’s Included:

Every month you get 3 private label rights eBooks, that means that you can put your own name to these products and sell them as your own; add your own affiliate links, virally drive traffic to your own websites and products; you brand your name as an expert - you can do whatever you like with these.

You’ll also receive a complete minisite including graphics and ebook cover graphics for each one. Everything is ready to go.

There’s also a bunch of extra PLR articles, which you can use to submit to article directories or your blog to drive traffic to your mini-sites.

As if that wasn’t enough, you also get a bonus PLR eBook and some great special offers, and then there’s the audio eBook!!!!

I’m in danger of gushing now, aren’t I?

I can assure you that I didn’t stop there… of course, I downloaded everything and tooka good look and it’s hot stuff, excellent quality and the graphics are top quality, as most of you have come to expect from Planet Divinity.

And for those that might find it a little overwhelming knowing what to do with all this top quality stuff, particularly the sales pages, there’s a whole section of tutorials to show you what to do and how to do it, step-by-step.

And these boys haven’t left anything out, they realise that some people like to learn from videos and some from copy, so there’s tutorials in both video and text.

For those interested in placing your new PLR products on eBay…. well, you’re catered for too.

You’ll be delighted with the CD and DVD graphics and the excellent eBay listings templates.

Another great feature is the requests area where you can send in niche requests - so, for example, if you’d like an eBook and mini-site in the dieting niche or the basket weaving niche, just ask away - cool bananas!

Oh, and I forgot to tell you that you can’t afford to dither if you want to grab this! Why?

1. There are only 200 slots available at the low introductory price

2. There’s a fast action bonus of lifetime Membership to John Thornhill’s Mentorship Monthly

http://www.paulabrett.com/Recommends/PLRMonthly.php

All in all, I dont think you can go wrong with this package. For as long as I’ve known them Daniel and Dave have always produced well thought out, top quality, customer-friendly products and I can see that this tradition will continue with PLR Monthly.

I’m just hoping that my nosey-parker membership isn’t revoked now I’ve finished rummaging …. come on boys???

Posted in Affiliate Marketing, Article Marketing, Reviews | No Comments »