How to use RSS to Enhance Your Business
Did you know there are lots of ways RSS can be used for your business? Here are some example uses that you may not know about. Quick note: Some can be easily abused so use them wisely, if you use it.
Twitter: Automatically create a new tweet when you have new posts. There are many ways to do this, a popular and free tool to use is Twitterfeed.
Facebook: Create updates when you make new posts. There are applications you can use to do this. I've found Facebook apps to be very flaky but one that seems to work is My Blogs.
Widgets: design a special widget related to your blog. The widget could then be displayed on their own blogs or even on their desktop. This can easily be done with Spring Widgets or Google Gadgets.
Offer downloads - compile a PDF document, or offer a video. Publishing a podcast, radio or other media is also a good idea.
Affiliates RSS feeds: Allow your affiliates to display your content wherever they wish. Give them the incentive by branding any links with their affiliate ID. This will credit them with any purchases made from your sites.
Deal finder: we all like to save money, especially when it comes to spending money on our business. Large online stores like Amazon or shop.com offer "deal of the day" or similar offers. These offers can be subscribed to your feed reader, so they will display as soon as they are available.
Package tracking: have your RSS feed update to alert you to the status of your deliveries. Use a solution like SimpleTracking.com.
Yahoo answers - If You use Yahoo answers to promote your business by answering consumers questions, you can subscribe to an RSS feed that specifically notifies you if a question comes up that is related to your field or product category.
Track your own or other blogs' comments: Sometimes email notifications quit working. But the RSS always does. If you are using a WordPress blog, your comment feed is usually: http://yourblog.com/?feed=comments-rss2 or http://yourblog.com/comments/feed/
Competitor watch: Find out what competitors or other marketers are doing on social networks, blogs, video and more using FriendFeed.
Track what's going on in your industry: Do a search on Yahoo or MSN for a keyword or phrase you'd like to watch. Using Firefox or IE 7, an RSS feed icon will appear. Click to subscribe.
Advertisements: I've never tried RSS advertising, but I have displayed the odd advertisement in an RSS feed. Surprisingly this CTR for the sites I used out performed click throughs' from the website itself. Pheedo, FeedBurner and Text-Link-Ads make RSS advertising possible.
Keep clients updated - notify your customers off your current service status. Businesses to offer usable services like online shopping, web hosting or payment gateways should use this. Using RSS, your clients can be updated by the second.
Twitter: Automatically create a new tweet when you have new posts. There are many ways to do this, a popular and free tool to use is Twitterfeed.
Facebook: Create updates when you make new posts. There are applications you can use to do this. I've found Facebook apps to be very flaky but one that seems to work is My Blogs.
Widgets: design a special widget related to your blog. The widget could then be displayed on their own blogs or even on their desktop. This can easily be done with Spring Widgets or Google Gadgets.
Offer downloads - compile a PDF document, or offer a video. Publishing a podcast, radio or other media is also a good idea.
Affiliates RSS feeds: Allow your affiliates to display your content wherever they wish. Give them the incentive by branding any links with their affiliate ID. This will credit them with any purchases made from your sites.
Deal finder: we all like to save money, especially when it comes to spending money on our business. Large online stores like Amazon or shop.com offer "deal of the day" or similar offers. These offers can be subscribed to your feed reader, so they will display as soon as they are available.
Package tracking: have your RSS feed update to alert you to the status of your deliveries. Use a solution like SimpleTracking.com.
Yahoo answers - If You use Yahoo answers to promote your business by answering consumers questions, you can subscribe to an RSS feed that specifically notifies you if a question comes up that is related to your field or product category.
Track your own or other blogs' comments: Sometimes email notifications quit working. But the RSS always does. If you are using a WordPress blog, your comment feed is usually: http://yourblog.com/?feed=comments-rss2 or http://yourblog.com/comments/feed/
Competitor watch: Find out what competitors or other marketers are doing on social networks, blogs, video and more using FriendFeed.
Track what's going on in your industry: Do a search on Yahoo or MSN for a keyword or phrase you'd like to watch. Using Firefox or IE 7, an RSS feed icon will appear. Click to subscribe.
Advertisements: I've never tried RSS advertising, but I have displayed the odd advertisement in an RSS feed. Surprisingly this CTR for the sites I used out performed click throughs' from the website itself. Pheedo, FeedBurner and Text-Link-Ads make RSS advertising possible.
Keep clients updated - notify your customers off your current service status. Businesses to offer usable services like online shopping, web hosting or payment gateways should use this. Using RSS, your clients can be updated by the second.
About the Author:
If you're looking to pull more profit out of your business blog, check out the IM Blogging Bootcamp. This 4-week intensive program designed to get you actively and effectively blogging to reach more of your prospects and convert more of them into lifelong customers.
