No matter what what industry you are in, it’s vitally important to provide quality information to your site users. For example, if your business provides accounting services, it’s a good idea to publish useful information from the taxation office, such as news or updates on tax rulings, small business tax tips, etc.
The problem with creating this type of information, however, is that it involves an enormous amount of work and expertise. You have to sift through, research, and organize a lot of data, check your facts, write and edit content (or hire someone to do this for you), and then make sure that this information is continually kept up-to-date. As you can imagine, this is not only a huge amount of work but most of the information you are dealing with is beyond your control.
Fortunately, there is a simpler way to keep your users up-to-date with your information.
It’s called RSS …
(RSS - One of the easiest ways to provide your site readers with the latest information)
The Ultimate Guide To WordPress RSS
Some Basic Information About RSS
- RSS, which, according to some definitions stands for Rich Site Summary, is more commonly known now as Really Simple Syndication. It is often called a “feed” or “news feed”.
- RSS lets content publishers automatically syndicate their content so that their users can read it without having to keep revisiting their site to check for updates.
- RSS feeds are also used to publish information that is frequently updated, such as new blog entries, news, videos, etc., which users can then subscribe to.
- Essentially, an RSS feed is an XML (Extensible Markup Language) document that includes full or summarized text along with metadata like date of publishing, feed author, etc. It allows people to subscribe to content on sites that publish feeds and then browse any updates posted on these sites using a feedreader. Conversely, RSS feeds also enable publishers to syndicate their information automatically.
- Feeds can be made available in different types and read by different feed readers. Some of these include RSS feeds, Atom (also called AtomPub or APP feeds and RDF (RDF = Resource Description Framework) feeds. All of these formats, however, use a standard XML file format to ensure compatibility with different machines, feed readers, and programs.
- Many sites and software tools also allow you to combine many RSS feeds to receive news and updates from different sources.
In this article, we explain where your RSS feed is located, how to syndicate your content online using feeds, and how to display someone else’s content on your site using RSS.
RSS (Really Simple Syndication) Feeds
Content syndication is a very powerful and legitimate way of sharing web content. RSS Feeds provide a simple way for online users to receive the latest information posted on sites and blogs they are interested in.
First, let’s take a look at content syndication.
News reporting agencies rely on syndication to publish content from news sources all around the world.
Content syndication allows most leading online newspapers to deliver readers the most recent news items and newsworthy stories from all over the planet without having to post more news reporting agencies everywhere around the world …
(Online newspapers and many highly-visited media publications use syndication to publish newsworthy content from other news agencies all around the planet.)
Syndication is used to share content legitimately. Online newspapers syndicate information using feeds …
(Content syndication is used by news reporting agencies to share content with other publications)
Most sites actually want you to share their information. Syndicating content not only allows information of great value to be shared, but it also sends visitors back to the site that originally created theoriginally created and published the content being syndicated. This can be an effective way to generate web traffic.
Many online newspapers and leading online media publications include an RSS feed section (look for menu links that say ”RSS”, “Syndication”, or “Newsfeeds” in them, or just search for “name of site/keyword + rss” – e.g. “nytimes rss”, “belfast telegraph rss”, “sydney morning herald rss”, etc.) …
(Many news publishers and major online media publications will have a feed section. Source: smh.com.au )
Clicking on a site’s RSS links section brings up a directory of different RSS feed sections of the site …
(RSS feeds section. Image Source: NY Times)
These RSS feed items allow you to access different sections of the website (e.g. technology news, entertainment news, jobs, etc.)
Feed sections can also contain feed subcategories …
(Feed sections can also contain subcategories. Source: LA Times RSS)
Note: A feed is only a URL. To use a feed, all you have to do is copy the URL and paste it into a program that can process the feed into something readable. We’ll cover this further below.
Using RSS Feeds
Syndicating someone else’s content on your site has some obvious benefits. It not only gives someone else’s content additional exposure online, it also adds value to your site without you having to create this content …
(Syndicating Content Has Many Benefits!)
While adding feeds from another site is a great way to add content to your site that you don’t have to create, it’s worth keeping in mind that you also want other websites to syndicate your content.
When other websites syndicate your feed, this gives your business the opportunity to gain increased exposure online and drive more visitors …
(Get users to syndicate content using your feed … it will help to increase your web traffic!)
Overview Of The WordPress Feed
WordPress automatically publishes a feed of all your posts, allowing other online users to syndicate your content on their websites.
Depending on your theme, there are a number of ways to access your WordPress RSS feed:
1) If your theme allows the Meta widget to be displayed on your sidebar or footer menu, scroll down to the Meta section and click on Entries RSS …
(WordPress Meta widget)
2) You can also find built-in links and/or buttons on certain themes that let your visitors copy your feed.
For example, in the screenshot below, a visitor can copy the feed URL by clicking on on the Subscribe to RSS link …
(Copy RSS URLs to your clipboard from “subscribe to RSS” buttons)
3) On many websites and again, depending on your WordPress theme, you can find the RSS feed displayed in a Link To Us, Follow Us, or Share toolbar section …
(Look for an RSS button in a a Stay In Touch, Share, or Link To Us section)
4) You can also view your RSS 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 WordPress installation is in a subdomain, e.g. “blog”)
Using any of the above methods will bring up a page containing your WordPress RSS feed …
(RSS entries seen using Firefox)
Note that your feed items will display differently depending on the web browser you use …
(Feed entries as seen with Google Chrome)
Specify Number Of Items To Display On Your RSS Feed
You can specify how many items you want displayed in your RSS section, by going to your Reading Settings section and entering the number of items to show in the “Syndication feeds show the most recent” field …
(WP Reading Settings – Number of syndication feed items)
Your feed will show as many recent items you have specified in your WordPress Reading Settings section …
(Your feed will show as many recent posts as you have specified in your WordPress Reading Settings section)
Display Full Text Or Summary Of Posts In Your RSS Feed
The other setting in your WP Reading Settings section that affects your feeds is whether to display each article in a feed as full text, or as a summary …
(WordPress Reading Settings – Display ‘Full Text’ or ‘Summary’ for articles in a feed)
Post Excerpts can also affect how the content in your feed displays …
(Post excerpts can affect how a feed will display)
We have written a detailed tutorial on Post excerpts here:
View The Content Of Your RSS Feeds
As mentioned previously, all that’s required to view the content of a feed is to copy the feed’s URL and paste it into an application that can read and translate feeds into readable content for humans.
Let’s show you how this works.
First, go to a website whose content you want to syndicate and look for a ’subscribe to feed’ link …
(Look for an RSS feed icon. Image source: YourCoffeeGuru.com)
Next, copy the feed URL to your clipboard …
(Copy your feed URL)
If you want, you can check what the feed contains by pasting the URL of the feed into an online feedreader …
(Paste your feed URL into a feed reader to view the content. Image Source: Feedreader.com)
Like feedreaders, WordPress also has the ability to process XML/RSS feeds.
How To Add Feeds To WordPress Sites
In the example below, we’ll add content from other website’s RSS feeds to your WordPress site.
Adding Feeds To Your Sidebar
As mentioned earlier, no matter what industry your business operates in, you could easily add to your site the latest news and updates from an industry-related government department or authoritative site in your industry by simply adding their RSS feed. You can use RSS feeds to display a range of information on your WordPress site such as news, social media updates, or content from thousands of sites using the WordPress RSS widget.
Let’s add RSS content to the WordPress sidebar navigation area …
(Add content from an RSS feed to the WordPress sidebar navigation menu)
First, Find a site containing content that you would like to add to your site and copy the RSS feed URL to your clipboard …
(Copy your feed URL to your clipboard)
Next, go to your Widgets section and paste the feed into an RSS widget …
(Widgets Section – RSS Widget)
To learn more about using sidebar widgets, go here:
Load your site in your web browser. The content from the RSS feed should display on your 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:
Adding Content From RSS Feeds To Your WordPress Posts
Can you add content from an RSS feed to a post instead of a sidebar? Yes, you can!
You can do this using plugins. Just search on WordPress.org plugin repository for RSS Aggregator, RSS feed to post, etc.
(RSS plugins)
Note: Most RSS plugins typically require configuration – visit the plugin sites for setup instructions, or contact us if you need assistance configuring plugins.
Here are some auto blogging tools that allow you to create new using RSS feeds:
WPeMatico
(WPeMatico WordPress Plugin)
WPeMatico is an easy to use plugin that allows you to publish posts automatically from RSS/Atom feeds of your choice.
You can manage all the feeds you import and organize them according to campaigns and categories.
For more details, go here:
WP RSS Aggregator
(WP RSS Aggregator – WordPress Plugin)
WP RSS Aggregator is a comprehensive RSS feed importer and autoblogging plugin for WordPress that offers additional functionality with a number of premium add-ons.
For example, the Feed to Post add-on lets you import RSS feeds directly into your WordPress posts.
For more details, go here:
RSS Post Importer
(RSS Post Importer Plugin For WordPress)
RSS Post Importer lets you syndicate, curate, import, merge and display full text RSS feeds on your WordPress website or blog.
The plugin will fetch an RSS feed and publish the full article content of every item in your feed as a separate post.
For more details, go here:
Powr RSS Feed
(Powr RSS Feed WordPress Plugin)
POWr RSS combines and displays content from a number of different sources using RSS feeds.
The plugin also lets you display images, videos, and article content, adjust sizing and spacing of feeds, use custom colors, backgrounds, fonts, and more. It also displays feeds correctly on all computers, phones, and tablets and supports text in every language.
The premium edition of POWr contains a number of additional features.
For more details, go here:
WP Pipes
(WP Pipes)
WP Pipes is a powerful data migration plugin that allows you to create curate content from RSS feeds, Google News, and other sources.
This plugin provides loads of powerful features like CSV importing for posts/WooCommerce, RSS feed creator, autoblogging, auto post to LinkedIn/Twitter/Facebook, export WordPress posts as iTunes podcasts, create Google XML sitemaps, and help take your WordPress CMS to a new level.
For more details, go here:
FeedWordPress
(FeedWordPress Plugin)
FeedWordPress is a versatile 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.
You can use this plugin to create aggregator sites, or display all of your online activity (e.g. from your blog, Facebook, YouTube, or other online services, in one place.
For more details, go here:
Autoblog by WPMUDev
(Autoblog Plugin For WordPress)
Autoblog is an easy-to-use plugin that can be set-up very quickly, with no coding required and no complicated instructions. Simply copy and paste in your feed URL, name your feed (for admin purposes) and select a blog that you want it to post to.
For more details, go here:
RSS Includes Pages
(RSS Includes Pages Plugin)
RSS Includes Pages and Custom Post Types modifies your RSS feeds to include pages in addition to posts.
For more details, go here:
WordPress RSS – Useful Tips
Tip #1 – Comment RSS Feeds
WordPress makes available RSS feeds of your post comments in addition to displaying feeds of your latest posts.
To view these, go to the ‘Meta’ widget area on your sidebar menu (note: this section may not be visible on some themes) and click on Comments RSS …
(Comments Feed)
Comments posted on your site by visitors and users can be seen in the Comments RSS page …
(Comments feed items viewed on Firefox browser)
Like post entries, your comments feed content will display differently depending on the browser you are using …
(RSS comments feed entries viewed using Google Chrome)
Again, you can check the feed content by pasting the URL of the feed into a feedreader …
(Paste your URL of your comments feed into a feed reader to view the content. Source: 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 WordPress site installation is in a subdomain, e.g. “blog”)
Tip #2 – Displaying Feeds For Specific Post Items
Being able to select an RSS feed for a single post can be useful. For example, you may want to add feeds from specific items 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 specific post item is shown below:
(Specific Post RSS Feed)
To create the above feed, copy the post URI, and append “/feed/?withoutcomments=1” to the end.
(Single Post Feed)
Note: By default, if you only append “/feed” to the end of the URI of your post, WordPress will return the comments made on your post, not the post content itself.
Tip #3 – Displaying Category RSS Feeds
Some your site users may only want to syndicate content about certain topics. They may not want to subscribe to your entire site’s feed.
With WordPress, you can create category feeds.
Just use the format below:
(Use this format for WP post categories feed)
Copy the category link address to your clipboard …
(Copy the selected category URL …)
Append “feed” to the end of it …
(WP post categories feed format)
Your category RSS feed now only contains content assigned to that particular category …
(Category RSS feed)
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 – Publish A Directory Of Feeds
You can set up your own list of feeds for your visitors that allows readers to subscribe only to content in specific categories …
(Publish A Page Of Feeds On Your Site)
You can also link an icon to a feed URL and then create a table or a list of all category feeds on a new page …
(RSS button. Image: public-domain-photos.com)
To learn more about adding tables to WordPress pages and posts, refer to this tutorial:
RSS – Notes
You can customize your feeds in a number of ways, such as adding videos to feeds, ads, etc. Some of these customizations require code editing skills.
WordPress allows different feed configurations that do not require messing with code. Here are some examples of feeds you can create …
(WordPress RSS – Custom Feeds)
Below are the feed types, descriptions, and feed examples shown in the table above:
- Feed Type: All Posts
- Description: Content feed – RSS feed that includes your latest entries
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/feed/
- Feed Type: All Comments
- Description: Comments feed – RSS feed containing the latest comments left on your website or blog
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/comments/feed/
- Feed Type: Individual Posts
- Description: RSS feed containing individual posts
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/title-of-your-blog-post/feed/
- Feed Type: Individual Posts Comments
- Description: Includes the latest comments made on an individual post entry
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/post-title/feed/
- Feed Type: Archives
- Description: Day – Contains latest posts in each archive
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/2018/10/30/feed/
- Feed Type: Archives
- Description: Month – Includes the latest post entries in each archive
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/2010/04/feed/
- Feed Type: Archives
- Description: Year – Contains latest entries in each archive
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/2016/feed/
- Feed Type: Search Results
- Description: RSS feed that displays the latest items for a search query
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/search/term/feed/
- Feed Type: Custom Post Type
- Description: Contains the latest posts for a custom type (e.g. book)
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/feed/?post_type=book
One more thing …
It’s a good idea to let your site visitors know that they can subscribe to your RSS feed. Make sure you place your subscribe button somewhere visible …
(Encourage your visitors to syndicate your feeds!)
Finally, keep in mind that other website owners will only want to subscribe to your content if you provide great content that educates, engages, and entertains. In other words, focus on providing your subscribers with high-quality information that will add great value to their sites and benefit their users.
(Add someone else’s content and get other users to subscribe to your content with RSS!)
If you need help coming up with content ideas subscribe to our FREE content creation course using the form below:
Also, don’t forget to subscribe to our RSS feed 🙂
Additional Resources:
- Download RSS Feed Images – Visit FeedIcons.com or search online (e.g. “free RSS icons”, “RSS icon”, etc.) for sites containing downloadable Free RSS images.
- RSSBoard.org – The RSS Advisory Board is an independent organization responsible for publishing RSS specifications, guiding developers who create RSS applications and helping to further the understanding of RSS.
- Wikipedia.org/RSS – Learn more about RSS.
- WordPress Codex: Feeds – Official WordPress documentation. Go here to learn more about feeds in WordPress.
Congratulations! Now you know how to find your WordPress RSS feed, how to syndicate your content online using RSS, and how to display someone else’s content on your site using their RSS feed.
Hopefully, now you have a better understanding of issues that can affect your website and how WordPress can help you grow your business online. To read more about using WordPress for a business website please click on links to visit other great content we have published on this site.
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"This is AMAZING! I had learnt about how to use WordPress previously, but this covers absolutely everything and more!! Incredible value! Thank you!" - Monique, Warrior Forum