No matter what service or product you provide or what industry your business belongs to, you need to provide high-quality information to your site or blog readers. For example, if your business provides medical services, it’s not a bad idea to publish information from the health department, such as news or updates on medical research, health and fitness advice, etc.
The problem with creating this kind of information, however, is that it requires a huge amount of effort and resources. You have to do a ton of data sorting, researching and organizing, fact-checking, writing and editing content (or hire someone to do this for you), and then make sure that this information is continually 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 completely beyond your control.
Thankfully, there is a simpler way to provide your users with great information.
It’s called RSS …
(RSS is one of the easiest ways to provide your users with the latest information)
The Ultimate Guide To WordPress RSS
RSS Made Simple
- RSS, which, according to some stands for Rich Site Summary, is more commonly known as Really Simple Syndication. It is often called a “feed” or “news feed”.
- RSS allows content publishers to automatically syndicate their content so that users can read it without having to keep revisiting their site to check for updates.
- RSS feeds are also used to publish frequently updated information, such as blog posts, news headlines, video lists, etc., which any user can then subscribe to.
- RSS feed content can be viewed using a software program called a feedreader, or aggregator. Feedreaders can be used to access new content published on websites and distribute this content (and updates made to this content) to other sites.
- There are different feed formats and these can be read by different feed readers. Some of these include RSS feeds, Atom feeds and RDF (Resource Description Framework) feeds. All of these formats, however, use a standard XML file format to ensure that feeds are compatible with different devices and programs.
- Many sites and software applications also allow you to combine many RSS feeds to receive news and updates sourced from multiple sites.
In this article, we explain how to find your WordPress RSS feed, how to use your WordPress RSS feed to get your content syndicated online, and how to add someone else’s content to your site via RSS.
RSS (Really Simple Syndication) Feeds
Content syndication is a very powerful and legitimate method used to share content online. Feeds provide a simple way for online users to keep up with the latest information published on sites and blogs they are interested in.
First, let’s look at how content syndication is used.
Online newspapers use content syndication to publish newsworthy content from other news agencies around the world.
Syndication allows most news reporting agencies to deliver readers up-to-the-minute news headlines and interesting stories from around the globe without having to hire additional news reporting departments in every location in the world …
(Global media publications rely on content syndication to publish newsworthy stories from news sources around the planet.)
Syndication is a legitimate method of sharing content. online media publications syndicate newsworthy content using news feeds …
(Syndication is a legitimate way of sharing information)
Most websites actually would like you to share their content. Content syndication not only allows information of great value to be shared, but it can also drive visitors back to the site that published the original content being syndicated. This creates links that can drive traffic back to their site.
Most content publishers will have a 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”, “telegraph rss”, “sydney morning herald rss”, etc.) …
(Many online newspapers and major sites provide links to a feed section. Source: Sydney Morning Herald )
Clicking on a site’s RSS feeds section will bring up a directory of different RSS feeds of the site …
(RSS feeds section. Source: NY Times RSS)
gives you access to information about different sections of the website (e.g. technology news, sports news, editorials, etc.)
An RSS feed list can also contain feed subcategories …
(RSS Feed section. Source: latimes.com feeds)
Note: An RSS feed is only a URL. To use a feed, all you need to do is copy the URL and paste it into an application that can translate the feed into something readable. We’ll cover this further below.
Syndicating Content – Benefits
Adding someone else’s content to your site has some obvious benefits. It not only helps someone else’s site, it also adds value to your site without you having to create this content …
(The Benefits Of Content Syndication)
While adding RSS feeds from another site is a great way to add content to your site without having to create it, it’s worth keeping in mind that you also want other websites to syndicate your content.
When other websites syndicate your content, you have the opportunity to get increased exposure online and drive new visitors …
(Get other online users to syndicate your content … it will help to increase your web traffic!)
WordPress RSS Feed – Overview
By default, WordPress automatically publishes a feed of your posts, allowing others to easily syndicate your content on their websites and blogs.
Depending on which theme you have installed, there are a number of ways to access your WordPress RSS feed:
1) If your theme displays the Meta widget in your navigation menu …
(The feed page will show the number of items you have specified in your 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 feeds is whether to display posts as full text, or just as a summary …
(Reading Settings – ’For each article in a feed show’: ‘Full text’ or ‘Summary’)
Post Excerpts can also affect how the content in your feed appears …
(Post excerpts can affect how a feed appears)
We have written a detailed tutorial on Post excerpts here:
View The Content Of Your RSS Feeds
As mentioned previously, to view the content of an RSDS feed, you need to copy the feed’s URL to your clipboard and paste it into an application that can read and translate feeds into readable content for humans.
Let’s take a look at how this works.
First, find a website or blog and look for a ‘subscribe’ link using any of the methods described earlier …
(Look for a ’subscribe to feed’ icon or link. Image source: http://www.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 what the RSS feed contains by pasting the feed URL into an online feedreader …
(Paste the feed URL into a feed reader to view the content. Source: http://feedreader.com/online)
Like feed readers, WordPress also has the ability to process XML/RSS feeds and convert these into readable content.
How To Add RSS Feeds To Your WP Site
Let’s show you how to add content from other sites to your WordPress site.
Adding A Feed To Your WordPress Sidebar
As mentioned earlier, no matter what industry your business is in, you could add to your site the latest news from an industry-related government department or authoritative site in your industry simply by importing their RSS feed. You can use 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 your sidebar …
(Let’s add content from an RSS feed to your sidebar)
First, Go to a website that publishes content that you would like to add to your site and copy its feed URL to your clipboard …
(Copy the feed URL to your clipboard)
Next, paste the feed into an RSS widget …
(RSS Widget)
To learn more about using widgets, go here:
Load your website in your browser. The content will now show in the sidebar (or wherever the RSS widget has been placed) …
(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 Feeds To Posts
What if you want to add content from an RSS feed to WordPress posts instead of a sidebar?
You can easily do this using WordPress plugins. Search inside the ’Add Plugins’ section (Plugins > Add New) for RSS Post, RSS feed to post, etc.
(’Add Plugins’ section)
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 autoblogging plugins for WordPress that allow you to automatically add new using feeds:
WPeMatico
(WPeMatico WP Plugin)
WPeMatico is an auto blogging plugin that allows you to publish posts automatically from multiple RSS/Atom feeds.
You can manage all the feeds you import and arrange feeds into campaigns and categories.
For more details, go here:
WP RSS Aggregator
(WP RSS Aggregator WP Plugin)
WP RSS Aggregator is a comprehensive RSS feed importer and auto blogging WordPress plugin with additional functionality with premium add-ons.
For example, the Feed to Post add-on for the WP RSS Aggregator plugin allows you to add content to your site automatically by importing RSS feeds directly into your posts.
For more details, go here:
RSS Post Importer
(RSS Post Importer – WordPress Plugin)
The RSS Post Importer plugin allows you to import, curate, syndicate, merge and display full-text feeds on your WordPress blog.
The plugin fetches an RSS feed and publishes the entire content of every item in the feed as a separate post.
For more details, go here:
Powr RSS Feed
(Powr RSS Feed)
With the POWr RSS Feed plugin, you can automatically combine and display content from various content using RSS feeds.
The plugin also lets you display videos, images, and article content, adjust feed priority, use custom fonts, backgrounds, colors, and more. It also displays feeds correctly on all phones, computers, and tablets and supports text in every language.
The premium edition of POWr 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 WP Plugin)
The WP Pipes plugin is a powerful data migration plugin that allows you to create curate content from RSS feeds, Google News, and many other sources.
This plugin provides loads of powerful features like CSV importing for posts/WooCommerce, RSS feed creator, auto blogging, auto post to LinkedIn/Facebook/Twitter, export 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 simple and flexible 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 FeedWordPress to create aggregator sites, or bring together all of your online activity in one place.
For more details, go here:
Autoblog by WPMUDev
(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 the URL of your feed, name your feed (for admin purposes) and select a blog to post content to.
For more details, go here:
RSS Includes Pages
(RSS Includes Pages – WordPress Plugin)
The RSS Includes Pages plugin modifies RSS feeds to include pages and not just posts.
For more details, go here:
Using WordPress RSS – Useful Tips
Tip #1 – WP Comment RSS Feeds
WordPress displays RSS feeds of comments posted on your site in addition to giving online users access to RSS feeds of your latest posts.
To access these comments, go to the ‘Meta’ widget area on your sidebar (note: this section may not be visible on some themes) and click on Comments RSS …
(WordPress Comments Feed)
All the comments posted on your site by visitors and users will appear in the Comments RSS page …
(Comments feed items seen using Firefox)
Like post entries, your comments feed page will display differently depending on which web browser you are using …
(Comments feed entries as seen with Google Chrome)
Again, you can check what the RSS feed contains by pasting the feed URL into an online feed reader …
(Paste your URL of your comments feed into a feed reader to view the feed 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 WP site installation is in a subdomain, e.g. “blog”)
Tip #2 – Accessing RSS Feeds For Individual Items
Being able to select an RSS feed for an individual post item 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 using an RSS feed for single posts is shown below:
(Single Post Feed)
To create the above feed, copy the post URL, and add “/feed/?withoutcomments=1” to the end.
(Single Post Feed)
Note: By default, if you only append “/feed” to the end of a post, WordPress will return the comments left on that post, not the content of the post itself.
Tip #3 – Using Post Category Feeds
Some your site visitors may only be interested in subscribing to content about certain topics. They may not want to subscribe to all of your site’s content.
WordPress allows you to create category feeds.
All you need to do is use the format shown below:
(WP category feed format)
Copy the category URL …
(Copy your category URL …)
And add the word “feed” to the end of it …
(WordPress category RSS feed format)
The feed now only displays content posted for that particular category …
(Category-specific 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 – Create A Page Of RSS Feeds On Your Site
You can create your own RSS feeds directory that allows readers to subscribe only to content in specific categories …
(Set Up A List Of Feeds)
All you need to do is link an image like the one shown below to a feed URL and then create a table or a list of all your individual feeds on a new page …
(RSS button. Source: http://www.public-domain-photos.com/free-cliparts/computer/other/rss_button_roman_bertle_01-2522.htm)
If you need help with creating tables in WordPress, see this tutorial:
WordPress RSS – Additional Notes
Feeds can be customized in several different ways, such as adding videos and images to feeds, ads, etc. Some of these customizations require code editing skills.
WordPress allows you to configure several feed types that do not require messing with code. Here are some examples of feed formats you can create …
(Different Custom Feeds You Can Create Using WordPress RSS)
Here are the different feed types, descriptions, and feed examples listed above:
- Feed Type: All Posts
- Description: Content feed – displays your latest posts
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/feed/
- Feed Type: All Comments
- Description: Comments feed – Feed that includes the latest comments left on your site
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/comments/feed/
- Feed Type: Individual Posts
- Description: RSS feed containing a specific post entry
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/post-title/feed/
- Feed Type: Individual Posts Comments
- Description: Includes the latest comments made on a post entry
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/title-of-your-blog-post/feed/
- Feed Type: Archives
- Description: Day – Includes the latest posts in each archive
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/2012/03/24/feed/
- Feed Type: Archives
- Description: Month – Feed displaying latest items in each archive
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/2010/02/feed/
- Feed Type: Archives
- Description: Year – RSS feed containing the latest posts in each archive
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/2011/feed/
- Feed Type: Search Results
- Description: Contains latest items for a search query
- Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/search/term/feed/
- Feed Type: Custom Post Type
- Description: Feed displaying the latest entries 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 users know that they can subscribe to your RSS feeds. Make sure you place a ’subscribe to RSS’ button image in a visible location …
(Encourage your visitors to syndicate your RSS feeds!)
Finally, keep in mind that other website owners will only syndicate your content if your content is useful, informative, or highly engaging. In other words, provide high-quality information that will add value to their sites and benefit their visitors.
(Easily add content to your site and get others to syndicate your content with RSS feeds!)
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 🙂
Additional Resources:
- Download RSS Feed Graphics – Visit sites like feedicons.com or search online (e.g. “free RSS icons”, “rss images”, etc.) for sites that allow you to download RSS icons.
- RSSBoard.org – The RSS Advisory Board Go here if you want to gain a better understanding of RSS.
- Wikipedia/RSS – Learn more about RSS feeds.
- WordPress.org/RSS Feeds – Official WordPress documentation site. Go here to learn more about using RSS feeds in WordPress.
Congratulations! Now you know how to find your WordPress RSS feed, how to syndicate your content online using RSS feeds, and how to add someone else’s content to your site using RSS feeds.
Hopefully, this article has given you a better understanding of issues that can affect your web site and how WordPress can help you get better results online. To read more about the benefits of using WordPress for a business website please click on links to visit our related posts section.
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