Over the weekend Neville Hobson posted a lengthy article about getting the most from RSS. The post is a good synopsis of why RSS is so important.
What I wanted to echo was the last line Neville wrote:
I'd just add one point to Robert's view - publish full content in your RSS feed, not an extract. Give me good reasons to come and visit you, not the (equally) lame way of using a bit of content with a dot-dot-dot at the end.lengthy
I couldn't agree more. I always add an RSS feed to my news reader with the intention of reading the content. You hear that blog author? I am saying to you, "I feel your content is valuable, so I am subscribing to your feed" But my time is valuable as well. By not publishing a full feed you are not providing me what I want, the content.
On the surface I could say that I will unsubscribe from any feed the does not publish a full feed without discussion, but this happens naturally. It's sort of like evolution. By not publishing your full content I don't read you as much, or the majority of your content requires a click. When the time comes around to optimize my 300+ feeds, your feed does not stick out in my mind as a valuable content source. I unsubscribe. A relationship lost.
Some people have theorized that blog publishers who intentionally do not publish a full feed do so to inflate the number of click-thrus to their blog. This might be true, but a recent experience I had offers a different option. Some blog authors don't know how to publish a full feed.
Recently I contacted Dave Aeillo who writes Operation Gadget. I told Dave that I liked reading his blog, but that I was on the verge of unsubscribing from his RSS feed since he did not provide a full content feed. His response? " I definitely could provide something more extensive than what I'm currently providing."
Dave was using the default RSS feed that his blog publishing tool created. He was considering using FeedBurner to optimize his feed, but hadn't make the jump yet. Hopefully he will make the switch and publish a full content feed.
Neville posted a follow-up on RSS today. The key line for me in that post:
As with so many things in this new communication world, the audience (readers) is firmly in charge.
How true.
Update: More thoughts on the relationship aspect of RSS
