No matter what what industry you belong to, it’s important to provide quality information on your site or blog. For example, if you provide travel-related services, it’s not a bad idea to provide users with the latest information from government and foreign travel-related departments, such as news or updates on travel warnings, advice from embassies, etc.
The problem with creating this kind of information, however, is that it is very time-consuming. You have to sort through, gather, and organize a ton of information, check your facts, write and edit content (or hire someone to do this for you), and then ensure that this information is continually up-to-date. As you can imagine, this not only involves a huge amount of work but most of the information you are dealing with is well beyond your control.
Thankfully, there is a much easier way to provide your users with expert, up-to-date information.
It’s called RSS …
(RSS - The easiest way to provide your readers with the latest information)
The Ultimate Guide To WordPress RSS
RSS – What Is It?
- RSS, which, according to some experts stands for Rich Site Summary, is more commonly referred to now as Really Simple Syndication. It it is also referred to as a “feed” or “web feed”.
- RSS lets content publishers automatically syndicate their content to save readers time from having to keep revisiting their site to check for updates.
- Feeds are also used to publish frequently updated information, such as new blog post items, news, videos, etc., to which any user can choose to subscribe.
- Essentially, an RSS feed is a structured XML document that includes either full or summarized text along with other metadata such as published date, feed author, etc. It allows people to subscribe to content on sites that publish feeds and then browse updates posted on these sites using a feedreader. Conversely, RSS feeds also enable publishers to syndicate their information automatically.
- There are different kinds of feeds, read by different feed readers. Some of these include RSS feeds, Atom Publishing Protocol) feeds and RDF feeds. All of these formats, however, use a standard XML file format to ensure that feeds are compatible with different devices, feed readers, and programs.
- Many sites and software tools also let you combine multiple RSS feeds to display news and updates from many different sources.
This in-depth guide shows you where your RSS feed is located, how to syndicate your content online using RSS, and how to add someone else’s content to your site using RSS feeds.
RSS (Really Simple Syndication) Feeds
Content syndication is a very powerful way of sharing web content. Feeds provide online users with a way to keep up with the latest information published on sites they are interested in.
First, let’s take a look at syndication.
Online media publications use syndication to publish newsworthy content from other news agencies around the world.
Syndication allows online newspapers to deliver readers up-to-date news and stories of general interest from all around the planet without having to post more news staff to every location in the world …
(News reporting agencies rely on syndication to publish stories from other news agencies around the planet.)
Syndication is a legitimate way of sharing information with other sites. News reporting agencies syndicate news stories using feeds …
(Syndication is a legitimate way of sharing information)
Most websites actually want you to share their content. Syndicating content not only allows information of great value to be shared, but it can also drive visitors back to the site that originally created theoriginally created and published the content being syndicated. This creates new ways to drive traffic back to their site.
Most online newspapers include an RSS feed section (look for navigation links that say “RSS” or “Newsfeeds” in them, or just search for “name of site/keyword + rss” – e.g. “nytimes rss”, “international herald tribune rss”, “sydney morning herald rss”, etc.) …
(Most online newspapers and major online media publications will contain an RSS feed section. Image: Sydney Morning Herald )
Clicking on a site’s RSS links section brings up a directory of RSS feeds for different content sections of the site …
(RSS Feeds. Image: nytimes.com RSS feeds)
Each of these RSS feed items allows readers to access information from different areas of the site (e.g. business news, entertainment news, jobs, etc.)
A feed list can also contain further subcategories …
(An RSS directory can also include subcategories. Source: latimes.com)
Note: A feed is just a URL. To use the feed, all that’s required is to copy the URL and paste it into an application that can process the feed into something readable. We’ll cover this further below.
Syndicating Content – Benefits
Syndicating someone else’s content on your site has some obvious benefits. It not only gives additional exposure online to someone else’s site, it also adds value to your site without you having to create that content …
(Syndicating Content - Benefits)
While adding an RSS feed from another site is a great way to add content to your site that you don’t have to create, it’s a great idea to try and get other websites to use YOUR content.
When other sites syndicate your feed, this gives you the opportunity to gain more exposure online and drive more visitors …
(It’s a good idea to get users to syndicate your content … it will help to increase your exposure online!)
WordPress Feed – About
WordPress automatically publishes a feed of your latest posts, allowing other online users to easily syndicate your content on their websites and blogs.
Depending on the WP theme you have installed, there are a few ways to get the WordPress RSS feed:
1) If your theme allows the Meta widget to be displayed on your navigation menu, scroll down to the Meta section and click on Entries RSS …
(WordPress Meta widget – Entries RSS)
2) You can also find built-in links and buttons on certain WordPress themes that let your visitors copy your feed.
In the screenshot below, for example, a visitor can simply copy the RSS feed URL by right-clicking and copying on the Subscribe to RSS link …
(Copy RSS links to your clipboard from “subscribe to RSS” buttons)
3) On some websites and again, depending on your WP theme, you can find the RSS feed displayed in a Follow, Link To Us, or Share fixed, floating, or slide-out toolbar …
(Look for an RSS button in a a Links, Social Share, or Follow Us section)
4) You can also view your feed by typing your site’s URL into a web browser and adding “/feed” after the URL, e.g.:
- http://www.yourdomain.com/feed
- http://www.yourdomain.com/blog/feed (if your website or blog has been installed in a subdomain, e.g. “blog”)
Using any of the above methods will bring up a page containing your WordPress RSS …
(RSS feed items viewed using a Firefox browser)
Note that your feed content will display differently depending on which browser you are using …
(RSS content as seen using Google Chrome)
Specify Number Of Items To Display On Your RSS Feed
To specify how many items you would like displayed in your Feeds section, go to your Reading Settings section and select the number of items to show in the “Syndication feeds show the most recent” field …
(WordPress Reading Settings – Syndication feeds)
Your feed page will show the number of posts as you have specified section …
(The feed page will show as many recent items you have specified in your Reading Settings section)
Display Full Text Or Summary Of Posts In Your RSS Feed
The other setting in the WordPress Reading Settings section that affects your RSS feed is whether to display posts as full text, or as a summary …
(WP Reading Settings – Display ‘Full Text’ or ‘Summary’ for articles in a feed)
Post Excerpts can also affect how your feed content displays …
(Post excerpts can affect how your feed content will appear)
For a detailed step-by-step tutorial about using excerpts in WordPress Posts, go here:
View The Content Of Your RSS Feeds
As mentioned previously, all you need to do to view a feed’s content is to copy the feed’s URL and paste it into an application that translates feeds into readable content for humans.
Let’s show you how this works.
First, go to a website whose feed you want to subscribe to and search for a ‘subscribe’ link or icon using any of the methods described earlier …
(Search for a ’subscribe to feed’ icon or link. Image source: http://www.yourcoffeeguru.com)
Next, copy the feed URL to your clipboard …
(Copy the feed URL)
If you want, you can check what the feed contains by pasting the URL of your feed into a feed reader …
(Paste your feed URL into a feed reader to view the content. Image: Feedreader)
Like feed readers, WordPress has the ability to process RSS feeds and convert these into content that can be read by your subscribers.
Adding An RSS Feed To Your WordPress Site
Let’s show you how to add content from other sites to your WordPress site.
Adding RSS Feeds To Your WordPress Sidebar
As mentioned earlier, no matter what industry your business is in, you could easily add to your site the latest news from an industry-related government department or authoritative site in your industry by simply importing content from their feed. You can easily display a range of information on your WordPress site like news, social media updates, or content from thousands of sites using the WordPress RSS widget.
Let’s add content from an RSS feed to the WordPress sidebar navigation menu …
(Add content from an RSS feed to your sidebar)
First, go to a website or blog containing content that you want to display on your sidebar and copy its RSS feed URL …
(Copy the URL of your feed to the clipboard)
Next, paste the feed into an RSS widget …
(Widgets Area – RSS Widget)
To learn more about using sidebar widgets, go here:
Refresh your web browser. The content from the RSS feed will now appear on the sidebar …
(RSS Widget)
Add Your WordPress RSS Feed To Search Consoles
You can add your WordPress RSS feed to Google and Bing’s search consoles. This will help them index your content faster.
(WordPress RSS feed added to Google Search Console)
Adding your site’s RSS feed to search consoles is simple, fast, easy, and requires no technical skills. For a step-by-step tutorial, go here:
How To Add RSS Feed Content To WordPress Posts
What if you want to add content from RSS feeds to posts instead of the sidebar?
You can do this using plugins. Search on the WordPress plugin directory for RSS Aggregator, RSS feed to post, etc.
(RSS plugins for WordPress)
Note: Most RSS plugins typically require configuration – visit the plugin sites for full instructions, or contact us if you need help with plugin configuration.
Here are a few plugins that allow you to curate and add content from RSS feeds to your pages and posts:
WPeMatico
(WPeMatico Plugin For WordPress)
WPeMatico is an easy to use autoblogging plugin that lets you publish posts automatically from RSS/Atom feeds of your choice.
You can manage all the feeds you import and arrange feeds according to categories.
For more details, go here:
WP RSS Aggregator
(WP RSS Aggregator Plugin)
WP RSS Aggregator is a comprehensive RSS feed importer and auto blogging plugin for WordPress that offers additional functionality with a number of premium extensions (add-ons).
For example, the Feed to Post extension is a popular, feature-rich importer that lets you autoblog by importing RSS feeds directly into your posts or any other custom post type.
For more details, go here:
RSS Post Importer
(RSS Post Importer Plugin)
RSS Post Importer lets you curate, syndicate, import, merge and display full-text RSS feeds on your WordPress website or blog.
The plugin will fetch an RSS feed and publish the entire content of each item in the feed as a standalone post.
For more details, go here:
Powr RSS Feed
(Powr RSS Feed Plugin)
The POWr RSS Feed plugin lets you combine and display content from various sources using RSS feeds.
The POWr RSS Feed plugin also lets you display videos, images, and articles, adjust feed spacing and size, use custom backgrounds, colors, fonts, and more. It also displays feeds correctly on all computers, phones, and tablets and supports text in every language.
The premium plugin version contains many additional features, such as the ability to display different feeds, manually accept or reject posts in your feed, and more.
For more details, go here:
WP Pipes
(WP Pipes WP Plugin)
The WP Pipes plugin for WordPress is a powerful data migration plugin that allows you to curate content from RSS feeds, Google News, and other sources.
This plugin provides features like CSV importing for posts/WooCommerce, RSS feed creator, auto blogging, auto post to LinkedIn/Twitter/Facebook, export your posts as iTunes podcasts, create Google XML sitemaps, and more!
For more details, go here:
FeedWordPress
(FeedWordPress – WordPress Plugin)
FeedWordPress is a flexible Atom/RSS syndication plugin for WordPress.
As stated in the FeedWordPress site …
FeedWordPress is an open-source Atom/RSS aggregator for the WordPress blog publishing platform. You set up feeds that you choose, and FeedWordPress syndicates posts from those sources into your WordPress posts table, where they can be displayed by your WordPress templates like any other post — but with additional meta-data, so that your templates can properly attribute the post to the source it came from.
FeedWordPress can be used to create aggregator site (sites that display content from multiple sources), or display all of your online activity (e.g. from your blog, Twitter, Flickr, or other online services, in one place.
For more details, go here:
Autoblog
(Autoblog – WordPress Plugin)
Autoblog is an easy-to-use plugin that can be set-up in minutes, with no coding required and no complicated instructions. Just copy and paste in your feed URL, give the feed a name (for admin purposes) and select a blog that you want it to post to.
For more details, go here:
RSS Includes Pages and Custom Post Types
(RSS Includes Pages and Custom Post Types WordPress Plugin)
You can install a plugin like RSS Includes Pages if you would like to include pages in your RSS feed and not just posts (by default WordPress only includes posts in your RSS feed).
For more details, go here:
WordPress RSS – Useful Tips
Tip #1 – Comment RSS Feeds
In addition to displaying RSS feeds of your posts, WordPress also displays RSS feeds of your post comments.
You can inspect the comments in your feed by clicking on Comments RSS in your ‘Meta’ section …
(WordPress Comments RSS)
All the comments posted on your site by visitors and users display in your Comments RSS page …
(Comments feed items as seen with a Firefox browser)
Like post entries, your comments feed content will display differently depending on the web browser you use …
(Comments feed entries viewed using Google Chrome)
Again, you can check the feed content by pasting the feed URL into an online feed reader …
(Paste your URL of your comments feed into a feedreader to view the feed content. Image: Feedreader)
Note: If the Meta section is not displaying on your theme, you can view the Comments RSS section of your site by opening up a browser and typing in the following URL:
- http://www.yourdomain.com/comments/feed
- http://www.yourdomain.com/blog/comments/feed (if your website or blog is located in a subdomain, e.g. “blog”)
Tip #2 – Creating RSS Feeds For Individual Posts
Being able to use an RSS feed for a single post can be useful. For example, you may want to add feeds from specific posts to RSS directories, or you may have created a valuable resource that other online users will want to syndicate.
The formula for accessing an RSS feed for a single post is shown below:
(RSS Feed For Single Post)
To create the above feed, copy the URI of your post, and add “/feed/?withoutcomments=1” to the end.
(Single Post RSS Feed)
Note: By default, if you only append “/feed” to the end of your post, WordPress will return the comments for your post, not actual content of the post itself.
Tip #3 – Post Category RSS Feeds
Some your site visitors may only want to subscribe to content from a specific category. They may not want to subscribe to all of your site’s content.
WordPress allows you to create individual category feeds.
Just use the format below:
(Format for WP category feed)
Copy the selected category link address …
(Copy the selected category link address …)
Now, add “feed” to the end of it …
(Use this format for WP category RSS feed)
The category RSS feed now only includes content posted for this category …
(Category RSS feed page)
The WordPress Codex also provides different ways to create feeds not just for post categories, but also feeds for tags, authors, search, etc.
For this example, let’s create a feed for a specific post category using the format shown below:
(Post Category feed format. Source: WordPress Codex)
Here is the feed format WordPress recommends using. In this example, the post category ID is ’42’. We’ll need to replace the post category ID and the domain name …
(WordPress post category feed format)
To find the post category ID, go to Posts > Categories …
(Posts > Categories menu)
Locate the post category you want and hover your mouse over the title to reveal its unique ID …
(Post Category ID)
In our example, the post category ID is ’29’ and the post category feed format we need to use for this specific category with our domain name looks like this …
(Post category feed format with domain name and ID)
Copy and paste the feed into your browser and hit enter …
(Paste the feed into your browser)
This will display the feed for that specific category …
(RSS feed of a specific post category)
Note that in this example, WordPress automatically converted the feed format we pasted into the browser into the category feed we had used in the previous section of this tutorial …
(Post category feed format)
Here is the feed format again …
(Post category feed)
In this case, the simplest way to create additional feeds for specific categories is to simply change the post category slug …
(Change the post category slug to create a new category specific feed)
Paste the edited feed into your web browser and hit enter to display the content for that specific category’s feed …
(Post category feed content)
Now that you have a method for creating feeds for specific post categories (or tags, authors, etc.), you can even create a directory or list of individual feeds for visitors.
Tip #4 – Set Up Your Own Page Of RSS Feeds
You can create your own RSS feeds list that allows readers to subscribe to content in specific categories …
(Set Up A Directory Of Feeds)
Link an RSS button like the one shown below to a feed and then create a table or a list of all your individual feeds on a separate page …
(RSS button. Source: public-domain-photos.com)
To learn more about creating tables in WordPress posts, see this step-by-step tutorial:
WordPress RSS – Notes
Feeds can be customized in several different ways, such as adding images and videos to feeds, ads, etc. Some of these feed customizations require editing code.
WordPress allows various RSS feed configurations without editing code. Here are some examples of custom feeds you can display …
(Different Custom Feeds You Can Create With WordPress RSS)
Below are the different feed types, descriptions, and feed examples shown in the diagram above:
- Feed Type: All Posts
- Description: Content feed – Feed that displays your latest entries
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/feed/
- Feed Type: All Comments
- Description: Comments feed – Displays the latest comments posted on your website or blog
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/comments/feed/
- Feed Type: Individual Posts
- Description: RSS feed containing single post entries
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/post-title/feed/
- Feed Type: Individual Posts Comments
- Description: RSS Feed for the latest comments made on specific posts
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/post-title/feed/
- Feed Type: Archives
- Description: Day – Includes the latest post entries in each archive
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/2013/11/23/feed/
- Feed Type: Archives
- Description: Month – Displays the latest posts in each archive
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/2015/03/feed/
- Feed Type: Archives
- Description: Year – Feed containing the latest posts in each archive
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/2014/feed/
- Feed Type: Search Results
- Description: RSS feed containing the latest posts for a search query
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/search/term/feed/
- Feed Type: Custom Post Type
- Description: Displays latest items for a custom type (e.g. book)
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/feed/?post_type=book
One more thing …
Remember to promote your feed. Make sure you place a ’subscribe to RSS’ button image somewhere visible …
(Promote your feeds!)
Keep in mind that other sites will only want to syndicate your content if you provide great content that informs, engages, and entertains. In other words, focus on providing your visitors with high-quality information that will add great value to their sites and benefit their users.
(Add content to your site and get other sites to syndicate your content online using RSS!)
If you need great content ideas subscribe to our FREE content creation course using the form below:
Also, don’t forget to subscribe to our RSS feed 🙂
RSS – Resources:
- Download RSS Images – Visit Iconspedia or search online (e.g. “free rss icons”, “RSS logo”, etc.) for sites that allow you to download Free RSS graphic elements.
- RSSBoard.org – The RSS Advisory Board Go here if you want to learn more about RSS.
- Wikipedia/RSS – General information about using RSS feeds.
- WordPress Codex: Feeds – WordPress software documentation. Go here for more information about WordPress RSS.
Congratulations! Now you know where your RSS feed is located, how to syndicate your content online using RSS, and how to display content from other websites on your site using RSS.
Hopefully, now you have a better understanding of issues that can affect your web site and how WordPress can help you expand your business online. To read more about using WordPress please click on links to visit other posts on this site.
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"I have used the tutorials to teach all of my clients and it has probably never been so easy for everyone to learn WordPress ... Now I don't need to buy all these very expensive video courses that often don't deliver what they promise." - Stefan Wendt, Internet Marketing Success Group