No matter what product or service you sell or what industry your business is a part of, it’s vitally important to provide quality information on your site or blog. For example, if you provide insurance services, it’s not a bad idea to provide users with the latest information from government departments, such as news and updates on statistical research, insurance tips, etc.
The problem with providing this type of information, however, is that it is really time-consuming. You have to sort through, research, and organize a ton of data, 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 completely beyond your control.
Thankfully, there is a much simpler way to keep your readers up-to-date with great information.
It’s called RSS …
(RSS is the easiest way to provide your users with great information)
The Ultimate Guide To WordPress RSS
RSS – What Is It?
- RSS stands for Rich Site Summary, or, as is more commonly referred to, Really Simple Syndication. It is often called a “feed” or “newsfeed”.
- RSS allows content publishers to automatically syndicate their content so that users can read it without having to keep revisiting sites to check for updates.
- Feeds are typically used to publish frequently updated information, such as blog posts, news headlines, audios, etc., which other users can then subscribe to.
- You can view the content of RSS feeds using a software-based program called a feed reader, or aggregator. Feedreaders are used to access new content published on websites and syndicate this content online.
- Feeds can be made available in different types and read by different feed readers. Some of these include RSS feeds, Atom Publishing Protocol) feeds and RDF (Resource Description Framework) feeds. All of these formats, however, use a standard XML file format to ensure compatibility with different machines, readers, and programs.
- Many sites and software tools also let you combine several RSS feeds to receive news and updates sourced from various other sites.
In this detailed article, you are going to learn where your RSS feed is located, how to use your WordPress RSS feed to get your content syndicated online, and how to display content from other websites on your site via RSS feeds.
RSS (Really Simple Syndication) Feeds
Content syndication is a powerful method used to share content online. Feeds provide a simple and easy way for online users to keep up with the latest information posted on different sites.
First, let’s take a look at content syndication.
Global media publications rely heavily on syndication to publish content from other news agencies all around the world.
Syndication allows online newspapers and highly-visited media publications to deliver readers stories from around the planet without actually having to employ and post more reporters to every location in the world …
(Media publications rely heavily on content syndication to publish newsworthy stories from other news agencies around the world.)
Syndication is used to share information legitimately. online media publications syndicate their news stories using news feeds …
(Online newspapers syndicate their content using news feeds)
Most websites actually want you to syndicate their content. Content syndication not only allows information to be shared, but it also drives visitors back to the site that originally published the content being syndicated. This can be an effective way to generate web traffic.
Many online newspapers and major content sites provide links to an RSS feed section (look for navigation links that say ”RSS”, “Syndication”, or “Newsfeeds” in them, or just search for “name of site/keyword + rss” – e.g. “nytimes rss”, “courier mail rss”, “sydney morning herald rss”, etc.) …
(Many online newspapers and major content sites contain a feed section. Source: smh.com.au )
Clicking on a site’s RSS feeds link brings up a directory of RSS feeds for different content topics on the site …
(RSS feeds section. Image: nytimes.com RSS feeds)
Each of these feed items lets readers access information from different areas of the website (e.g. business news, entertainment news, jobs, etc.)
An RSS directory can also contain further subcategory feeds …
(RSS Feed section. Image: latimes.com feeds)
Note: An RSS feed is just a URL. To use RSS feeds, all you need to do is to copy the URLs and paste these into an application that can process the feed into something readable. We’ll cover this further below.
Using Feeds – Benefits
Syndicating someone else’s content on your website has some obvious benefits. It gives additional exposure online to someone else’s business and adds value to your site without you having to create this content …
(The Benefits Of Using Feeds)
While adding RSS feeds 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 sites to use YOUR content.
When other sites syndicate content using your feed, this gives you the opportunity to get increased exposure online and drive more web traffic …
(Get other website owners to syndicate content using your RSS feed … it will help increase your exposure online!)
About Your WordPress RSS Feed
WordPress automatically publishes a feed of all your posts, allowing others to syndicate your content on their sites.
Depending on your WordPress site’s theme, there are a number of ways to access the WordPress RSS feed:
1) If your theme displays the Meta widget as part of your navigation menu …
(Your feed page will display the number of items you have specified in your WP Reading Settings section)
Display Full Text Or Summary Of Posts In Your RSS Feed
Another setting in the WP Reading Settings section that affects your RSS feed is whether to display each article in a feed as full text, or as a summary …
(Reading Settings – Show ‘Full Text’ or ‘Summary’ for articles in a feed)
Post Excerpts can also affect how the content in your feed displays …
(Post excerpts affect how your feed content appears)
We have created a detailed tutorial on using excerpts in WordPress Posts here:
View The Content Of Your RSS Feeds
As mentioned earlier, to view the content of an RSDS feed, you have to copy the feed’s URL and paste it into a feedreader, i.e. an application that reads and translates feeds into readable content.
Let’s see how this works.
First, go to a website whose content you want to subscribe to and search for a ‘subscribe’ link or button using any of the methods described earlier …
(Search for a ‘subscribe’ button or link. Image source: YourCoffeeGuru.com)
Next, copy the feed URL to your clipboard …
(Copy the URL of your feed to the clipboard)
If you want, you can check the feed content by pasting the feed URL into an online feedreader …
(Paste your feed URL into a feedreader to view the feed content. Source: Feedreader.com)
Like feed readers, WordPress has the ability to process RSS feeds and convert these into human-readable content.
Adding An RSS Feed To WordPress
In the example below, we are going to add content from other websites to yours.
How To Add A Feed To Your WordPress Sidebar
As mentioned earlier, no matter what industry you are part of, you can display on your site the latest news and updates from an industry-related government department or authoritative site in your industry simply by importing content from their feed. You can easily display a range of information on your WordPress site such as news, Facebook updates, or content from thousands of sites using the WordPress RSS widget.
Let’s add RSS content to the WordPress sidebar area …
(Add an RSS feed to your sidebar)
First, Go to a site that publishes content that you want to add to your sidebar and copy its feed URL to your clipboard …
(Copy your feed URL)
Next, log into your wordPress Dashboard and go to Appearance > Widget paste the feed into a new RSS widget …
(RSS Widget)
To learn more about adding content to sidebars using widgets, go here:
Refresh your browser. The content should appear in the sidebar (or wherever the RSS widget has been inserted) …
(RSS Feed Content Added To Sidebar Menu)
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 A Feed To Your Posts
Can content from RSS feeds be added to WordPress posts? It sure can!
You can easily do this using WordPress plugins. Search inside your ’Add Plugins’ section for RSS feed, RSS feed to post, etc.
(‘Add Plugins’ search results – RSS plugins)
Note: These plugins typically require configuration – visit the plugin sites for instructions, or contact us if you need help configuring plugins.
Here are some auto blogging tools that let you create new with RSS feeds:
WPeMatico
(WPeMatico)
WPeMatico is an autoblogging plugin that lets you publish posts automatically from multiple RSS/Atom feeds.
You can manage all the feeds you import and organize them according to campaigns.
For more details, go here:
WP RSS Aggregator
(WP RSS Aggregator)
WP RSS Aggregator is a comprehensive RSS feed importer and auto blogging WordPress plugin with a number of premium add-ons for additional functionality.
For example, the Feed to Post add-on for the WP RSS Aggregator plugin allows you to import RSS feeds directly into your WP posts or any other custom post type.
For more details, go here:
RSS Post Importer
(RSS Post Importer WP Plugin)
The RSS Post Importer plugin allows you to syndicate, import, curate, merge and display full-text RSS feeds on your WordPress site.
The plugin fetches an RSS feed and publishes the entire content of each item in your feed as a standalone post.
For more details, go here:
Powr RSS Feed
(Powr RSS Feed Plugin For WordPress)
With POWr RSS Feed, you can automatically combine and display content from a number of different sources using RSS feeds.
The POWr RSS plugin also lets you display videos, images, and articles, adjust feed size and spacing, use custom colors, fonts, backgrounds, and more. It also has mobile-responsive design and supports text in any language.
The premium edition of this plugin contains a number of additional features, such as the ability to display different feeds, accept or reject posts in your feed, and more.
For more details, go here:
WP Pipes
(WP Pipes – WordPress 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 many other sources.
This plugin provides loads of functionality like CSV importing for posts/WooCommerce, RSS feed creator, auto blogging, auto post to Facebook/Twitter/LinkedIn, export WordPress posts as iTunes podcasts, create Google XML sitemaps, and more!
For more details, go here:
FeedWordPress
(FeedWordPress WordPress Plugin)
FeedWordPress provides simple and flexible syndication options for WordPress.
As stated in the FeedWordPress website …
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 combine posts from multiple sources), or display all your online activity into a Lifestream.
For more details, go here:
Autoblog
(Autoblog by WPMUDev Plugin For WordPress)
Autoblog is an easy-to-use plugin that can be set-up very quickly, without coding skills or complicated instructions. Simply copy and paste in your feed URL, give the feed a name of your choosing (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 and Custom Post Types WP Plugin)
The RSS Includes Pages plugin modifies your RSS feeds to include pages and not just posts.
For more details, go here:
Using WordPress RSS Feeds – Useful Tips
Tip #1 – WP Comment RSS Feeds
In addition to giving online users access to RSS feeds of your posts, WordPress also makes available RSS feeds of the latest comments posted on your site.
You can see this feed by clicking on Comments RSS in your ‘Meta’ widget area (note: your theme may not be configured to display this widget) …
(Comments RSS)
All the comments posted on your site by visitors and users can be seen in the Comments RSS page …
(Comments feed items viewed using a Firefox browser)
Like post entries, your comments feed content will display differently depending on which web browser you use …
(Comments feed items viewed using Google Chrome)
Again, you can check the feed content by pasting the URL of the feed into an online feed reader …
(Paste the comments feed URL into a feed reader to view the content. Source: Feedreader.com)
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 is located in a subdomain, e.g. “blog”)
Tip #2 – Individual Post RSS Feeds
Being able to access 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 specific post is shown below:
(Feed For Single Post)
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 add “/feed” to the end of your post address, WordPress will return the comments made on your post, not actual content of the post itself.
Tip #3 – Using Category Feeds
Some your site users may only want to syndicate content from one or two post categories. They may not want to subscribe to all of your site’s content.
If your site displays content published under various categories, WordPress allows you to easily create a separate feed for each different category.
Just use the format shown below:
(Feed format for category)
Select and copy the category link address to your clipboard …
(Copy your category link address …)
Append the word “feed” to the end of it …
(RSS feed format for post categories)
The category RSS feed now only includes content posted in that category …
(Category 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 – Create Your Own Feeds List
You can create your own page of RSS feeds for your subscribers that allows your readers to subscribe only to specific categories …
(Provide A Page Of Feeds For Your Subscribers)
Link an icon like the one shown below to the URL of your feed and then create a table or a list of all individual feeds on a new page …
(RSS button graphic. Image Source: public-domain-photos.com)
We have created a detailed tutorial about inserting tables into WordPress here:
RSS Feeds – Notes
You can customize feeds in several ways, such as adding videos to feeds, ads, etc. Some of these feed customizations require editing code.
WordPress allows you to configure different feed types without messing with code. For example, the table below lists some of the kinds of custom feeds you can create …
(WordPress RSS – Custom Feeds)
Here are the different feed types, descriptions, and feed examples shown above:
- Feed Type: All Posts
- Description: Content feed – RSS feed that displays your latest post entries
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/feed/
- Feed Type: All Comments
- Description: Comments feed – Contains the latest comments left on your website
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/comments/feed/
- Feed Type: Individual Posts
- Description: RSS feed for a post entry
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/post-title/feed/
- Feed Type: Individual Posts Comments
- Description: Displays the latest comments made on an individual post entry
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/post-title/feed/
- Feed Type: Archives
- Description: Day – Feed containing latest entries in each archive
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/2010/11/18/feed/
- Feed Type: Archives
- Description: Month – Includes latest entries in each archive
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/2016/02/feed/
- Feed Type: Archives
- Description: Year – Feed containing latest items in each archive
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/2011/feed/
- Feed Type: Search Results
- Description: Displays latest entries for a search query
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/search/term/feed/
- Feed Type: Custom Post Type
- Description: Includes latest posts for a custom type (e.g. book)
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/feed/?post_type=book
One last thing …
It’s a good idea to let users know that they can subscribe to your feeds. Make sure you place your subscribe button image somewhere visible …
(Remember to make your feeds visible your feeds!)
Also, keep in mind that online users will only want to syndicate your content if you provide your visitors with very high-quality information that will add value to their sites and benefit their users.
(Add great content from other sites and get others to share your content with RSS feeds!)
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 RSS Resources:
- Feed Images – Visit online resource sites like FeedIcons.com or search online (e.g. “free rss icons”, “RSS logo download”, etc.) for sites that contain downloadable Free RSS graphic elements.
- RSSBoard.org – The RSS Advisory Board is an independent organization with three primary duties: publishing RSS specifications, providing guidance to developers who create RSS applications and helping to further the understanding of RSS.
- Wikipedia.org/RSS – General information about the history and benefits of using RSS.
- WordPress Codex – WordPress documentation and information site. Visit this site to learn more about WordPress and RSS.
Congratulations! Now you know where to find your WordPress RSS feed, how to syndicate your content online using feeds, and how to add someone else’s content to your site via their RSS feed.
Hopefully, this information has given you a better understanding of issues that can affect your website and how WordPress can help you build a better business online. To read more about the benefits of using the WordPress CMS software please see our related posts section.
***
"I am beyond impressed with what you have put together. I can tell that you put a ton of hard work into building what you have. You have the absolute best content on WordPress I have ever seen!" - Robert T. Jillie