EVERYONE could use more RSS subscribers to their blog.  As you know, RSS subscribers are the lifeblood of any successful blog… without them, your blog is doomed to blogging obscurity.  With lots of subscribers, however, you can bask in all your blogging glory and reap the benefits of a highly successful blog.

So HOW do you get more RSS subscribers?

Before you can figure out how to get more subscribers to your blog, you have to understand why people actually go to the trouble of subscribing to your feed.  Here’s why people subscribe… are you ready?

Readers subscribe to blogs and RSS feeds when those feeds provide so much value in either information or entertainment that it would be a loss to not subscribe.

Your blog visitors are consumers first and foremost.  Consumers monitor blogs to be educated, entertained, and informed… and they are looking for benefits.  ‘What’s in it for me?’ is the question at the top of a subscriber’s mind.  With this premise in mind, let’s talk about what you can do to increase your RSS subscribers.

1.  Provide high quality content.  Okay, no brainer here, but you’d be surprised how many people are completely missing the boat on this one.  As with everything else online, content is the key to success.  Make it thought provoking and original.

2.  Minimize advertising.  No one wants to read a post, no matter how informative, that contains dozens of links or blatant advertising.  It’s just irritating.  People won’t subscribe to your RSS feed if they see tons of advertising all over your blog pages, they’ll see the handwriting on the wall and subscribe to someone else’s feed.

3.  Educate your visitors about RSS.  It’s surprising to realize that there are a lot of people surfing online that don’t have a clue what RSS is or how to use it… especially in less sophisticated markets.  You have to explain how RSS works, how to subscribe, and how it will benefit your visitors.

4.  Provide obvious RSS subscription links.  No one can subscribe to your feed if they don’t know the URL… duh!

5.  Monitor your feed statistics.  Again, this seems pretty obvious, but if you aren’t actually monitoring how many people are subscribing then you’ll have no idea how your blog is doing.

Content. Content. Content.

Get the content right and you will gain RSS subscribers… I promise.

So, you’ve done everything right and gain lost of new RSS subscribers… but now you’ve got to keep up with your high-quality blog or you’ll lose all those subscribers just as fast.  Here’s my short list of reasons that you can lost RSS subscribers.

How to Lose RSS Subscribers

1.  Post useless content.  It’s completely ridiculous to think that anyone is going to subscribe to your RSS feed so that they can receive a daily dose of your advertising, sloppy content, and personal ego trips.  It’s even worse when you send them a bunch of PLR articles that you didn’t even bother to alter.  Being lazy with your content will cause you to instantly lose RSS subscribers.

2.  Post articles with tons of links to affiliate programs and other advertising.  Readers don’t like to think that they’re being sold.  If you hard sell them in every post they will unsubscribe.

3.  Post articles several times each day.  People like to receive great content, but you can’t post articles constantly and expect subscribers to actually read it.  They will just get overwhelmed and frustrated… frustrated subscribers don’t remain subscribers… they just delete your feed from their reader!

4.  Overhype your subscriber bonuses and under-deliver.  A lot of blogs use incentives to get people to subscribe… not a bad marketing strategy.  The problem arises when you’ve written great copy for the bonuses you’re offering then send them a bunch of useless or out of date ebooks, videos, or audio files.   Oops… delete!

5.  Post candy-coated or canned reviews.  If you’re an affiliate for a product, write your own original review and forget about using those canned reviews that some affiliate programs offer… RSS subscribers aren’t stupid… we know you didn’t write the review. 

I guess the bottom line when it comes to gaining RSS subscribers is to apply ’The Golden Rule’ to your blog.  Treat your blog visitors and RSS subscribers the way you would like to be treated when you visit other blogs.  Do this and you will get more RSS subscribers… I promise.

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Filed under: Blog Marketing • RSS Marketing • Web 2.0

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