No matter what product or service you provide or what industry your business is in, you need to provide high-quality information on your site or blog that better educates, informs, or improves engagement with your readers. For example, if your business provides travel-related services, you may want to publish the latest information from government departments and foreign travel offices, such as news and updates on travel warnings, advice from consular offices, etc.

To create and publish this kind of information, however, is really time-consuming. You have to do a ton of information gathering, researching and organizing, checking sources for accuracy, content writing and editing (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.

Fortunately, there is a simpler way to keep your readers up-to-date with your information.

It’s called RSS …

(RSS is the simplest way to provide your site visitors with great information)

The Ultimate Guide To WordPress RSS

RSS – Useful Information

• RSS is an acronym for RDF Site Summary, or, as is more commonly known, Really Simple Syndication. It can also be called a “feed” or “news feed”.
• RSS lets content publishers automatically syndicate their content to save readers time from having to keep revisiting sites to check for updates.
• Feeds are often used to publish information that is frequently updated, such as new blog post items, news, audio playlists, etc., which any user can then subscribe to.
• Essentially, an RSS feed is an XML (Extensible Markup Language) document that includes either full or summarized text along with other metadata such as published date, author, etc. It allows people to subscribe to content on websites and then browse updates posted on these sites through a feedreader. Conversely, RSS feeds also enable publishers to automatically syndicate web content.
• There are different kinds of feeds, read by different aggregators. 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 compatibility 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 various different sites.

In this in-depth guide, we show you where your RSS feed is located, how to syndicate your content online using feeds, and how to add content from other websites to your site using RSS.

RSS (Really Simple Syndication) Feeds

Content syndication is a really powerful (and legitimate) method used for sharing web content. RSS Feeds provide web users with a way to keep up with the latest information published on different websites.

First, let’s look at syndication.

Global media publications rely heavily on syndication to publish stories from news sources all around the world.

Content syndication allows digital publishing agencies to deliver readers the latest newsworthy items and content of interest from all around the planet without having to hire and post more news reporting and content writing staff to every location around the world …

(News reporting agencies rely on content syndication to publish news and stories from news sources all around the globe.)

Syndication is used to share newsworthy content legitimately. News reporting agencies syndicate their stories using feeds …

(Content syndication is a legitimate method of sharing content)

Most websites actually want you to syndicate their content. Content syndication not only allows information to be shared, but it can also drive visitors back to the original site that created and published the content being syndicated. This provides websites with additional opportunities to generate new web visitors.

Most leading online media publications will contain 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”, “daily telegraph rss”, “sydney morning herald rss”, etc.) …

(Major content sites will have a feed section. Image: Sydney Morning Herald )

Clicking on a site’s RSS feeds link brings up a directory of different RSS feeds of the site …

(A directory of feeds. Image: New York Times)

gives you access to content from different areas of the site (e.g. business news, entertainment news, lifestyle magazine, etc.)

An RSS directory can also contain feed subcategories …

(Feed sections can also contain feed subcategories. Image: Los Angeles Times RSS)

Note: An RSS feed is simply a URL. To use an RSS feed, all you have to do is copy the URL and paste it into software that can translate the feed code into something readable. We’ll cover this further below.

The Benefits Of Syndicating Content

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 …

(Content Syndication Benefits Someone Else’s Website And Yours!)

While adding an RSS feed from another site is a great way to add content to your site without having to create it, it’s a great idea to try and get other sites to use your content.

When other sites syndicate your content, you have the opportunity to gain increased exposure online and drive new visitors …

(Look for ways to get other website owners to syndicate your RSS feed … it will help to increase your traffic!)

WordPress Feed

WordPress automatically publishes a feed of all your posts, allowing others to easily syndicate your content on their websites.

Depending on the theme you have installed, there are a number of ways to access the WordPress RSS feed:

1) If your theme displays the Meta widget on your navigation menu …

(The feed will display as many recent posts as you have specified in the 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 as full text, or just as a summary …

(Reading Settings – Display ‘Full Text’ or ‘Summary’ for each article in a feed)

Post Excerpts can also affect how your feed content displays …

(Post excerpts affect how your feed content will appear)

To learn more about Post excerpts, see this tutorial:

• A Beginner’s Guide To Using Excerpts In WordPress Posts

View The Content Of Your RSS Feeds

As mentioned earlier, to view the content of an RSDS feed, you need to copy the feed’s URL and paste it into an application that can read and translate feeds into readable content.

Let’s see how this works.

First, find a website or blog and search for a ‘subscribe’ link …

(Search for an RSS feed icon. Image source: YourCoffeeGuru.com)

Next, copy the feed URL to your clipboard …

(Copy the URL of your feed to your clipboard)

If you want, you can check what the RSS feed contains by pasting the URL of your feed into an online feedreader …

(Paste your feed URL into a feed reader to view the content. Image Source: Feedreader)

Like feedreaders, WordPress also has the ability to process RSS/XML feeds and convert these into readable content.

How To Add RSS Feeds To WordPress Sites

Let’s show you how to add content from other websites or blogs to your site.

Adding RSS Feeds To Your Sidebar

As mentioned earlier, no matter what industry your business operates in, you could display on your site the latest news and updates from an industry-related government department or authoritative site in your industry simply by adding content from their RSS feed. You can easily display a range of information on your WordPress site like news, Facebook updates, or content from thousands of sites using the WordPress RSS widget.

Let’s add RSS content to your sidebar …

(Let’s add an RSS feed to the WordPress sidebar navigation menu)

copy the RSS feed from a website or blog that publishes content that you want to add to your site …

(Copy the URL of your feed)

Next, paste the feed into an RSS widget …

(Widgets Screen – RSS Widget)

To learn more about using sidebar widgets, go here:

• How To Use WordPress Widgets

Load your site in your browser. The content will now show in the sidebar (or wherever you have inserted the RSS widget – e.g. custom menu, footer, etc) …

(RSS Feed Content Added To WordPress Sidebar)

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 Set Up Webmaster Accounts

How To Add RSS Feeds To WordPress Posts

Can content from RSS feeds be added to posts instead of your sidebar? It sure can!

You can easily do this using plugins. Just search inside your ’Add Plugins’ section (Plugins > Add New) for RSS Post, RSS feed to post, etc.

(’Add Plugins’ screen)

Note: Most RSS plugins typically require configuration – visit the plugin sites for configuration instructions, or contact us if you need help with plugin configuration.

Here are some autoblogging plugins for WordPress that allow you to create new using 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 arrange them according to campaigns and categories.

For more details, go here:

• WPeMatico – WordPress Plugin

WP RSS Aggregator

(WP RSS Aggregator)

WP RSS Aggregator is an RSS feed importer and auto blogging WordPress plugin with premium add-ons for additional functionality.

For example, the Feed to Post add-on for the WP RSS Aggregator plugin lets you autoblog by importing RSS feeds directly into posts.

For more details, go here:

• WP RSS Aggregator Plugin For WordPress

RSS Post Importer

(RSS Post Importer WordPress Plugin)

RSS Post Importer lets you syndicate, curate, import, merge and display full-text RSS feeds on your WordPress blog.

RSS Post Importer will fetch an RSS feed and publish the entire content of each feed item as a standalone post.

For more details, go here:

• RSS Post Importer Plugin

Powr RSS Feed

(Powr RSS Feed Plugin For WordPress)

POWr RSS Feed allows you to automatically combine content from a number of different RSS feeds.

This plugin also lets you display images, videos, and article content, adjust feed size and spacing, use custom colors, backgrounds, fonts, and more. It also displays feeds correctly on any computer, phone, or tablet and supports text in any language.

The premium version of POWr contains many additional features.

For more details, go here:

• Powr RSS Feed Plugin For WordPress

WP Pipes

(WP Pipes Plugin)

The WP Pipes plugin is a powerful data migration plugin that lets you curate content from RSS feeds, Google News, and many other sources.

This plugin provides loads of powerful functionality like CSV importing for posts/WooCommerce, RSS feed creator, autoblogging, auto post to LinkedIn/Twitter/Facebook, export posts as podcasts, create Google XML sitemaps, and more!

For more details, go here:

• WP Pipes – WordPress Plugin

FeedWordPress

(FeedWordPress WP Plugin)

FeedWordPress provides simple and flexible Atom/RSS 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.

You can use this FeedWordPress to create aggregator site (sites that bring together posts from many different sources), or bring together all of your online activity (e.g. from your blog, LinkedIn, YouTube, or other online services, in one place.

For more details, go here:

• FeedWordPress – WordPress Plugin

Autoblog

(Autoblog by WPMUDev WordPress Plugin)

Autoblog is an easy-to-use plugin that can be set-up very quickly, without coding skills or complicated instructions. Just copy and paste in your feed URL, name your feed (for admin purposes) and select the blog to post content to.

For more details, go here:

• Autoblog – WordPress Plugin

RSS Includes Pages and Custom Post Types

(RSS Includes Pages WP Plugin)

The RSS Includes Pages and Custom Post Types plugin modifies RSS feeds to include pages and not just posts.

For more details, go here:

• RSS Includes Pages – WordPress Plugin

Useful Tips

Tip #1 – Comment RSS Feeds

WordPress displays RSS feeds of your post comments in addition to giving online users access to feeds of your posts.

To see these comments, go to the ‘Meta’ widget area on your sidebar (note: your theme may not be configured to display this widget) and click on Comments RSS …

(WordPress Comments Feed)

Comments posted on your site by visitors and users will appear in your Comments RSS page …

(Comments feed entries as seen with Firefox)

Like post entries, your comments feed items will display differently depending on which browser you are using …

(Comments feed items displayed with a Google Chrome browser)

Again, you can check the feed content by pasting the URL of the feed into a feed reader …

(Paste your feed URL into a feed reader to view the feed content. Image: 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 site has been installed in a subdomain, e.g. “blog”)

Tip #2 – Accessing RSS Feeds For Individual Items

Being able to display an RSS feed for single posts 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 single posts is shown below:

(Specific Post RSS Feed)

To create the above feed, copy the web address of your post, and append “/feed/?withoutcomments=1” to the end.

(Single Post RSS Feed)

Note: By default, if you only append “/feed” to the end of the URI of your post, WordPress will return the comments associated with your post, not the post content itself.

Tip #3 – Post Category RSS Feeds

Some your site users may only be interested in subscribing to content about specific categories. They may not want to subscribe to all of your site’s content.

If your website or blog publishes content under multiple categories, WordPress allows you to offer users a separate RSS feed for each post category.

Just use the format below:

(WP category feed format)

Select and copy the category link address to your clipboard …

(Select and copy your category link address …)

Add the word “feed” to the end of it …

(Format for WP category feed)

Your feed now only contains content posted under this 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 – Publish A Page Of Feeds

You can provide your own list of feeds for visitors that allows your readers to subscribe to specific content …

(Create Your Own Feeds Page)

All you need to do is link an RSS graphic to the URL of your category feed and then create a table or a list of your feeds on a separate page …

(RSS icon. Image Source: public-domain-photos.com)

We have created a detailed tutorial about creating tables in WordPress content here:

• Adding Tables In WordPress Posts And Pages

WordPress RSS – Notes

RSS feeds can be customized in several ways, such as adding videos to feeds, ads, etc. Some of these feed customizations require code editing skills.

WordPress allows you to configure various feed types that do not require messing with code. Here are some examples of custom feeds you can create …

(Different Feed Types You Can Create With WordPress RSS)

Below are the feed types, descriptions, and feed examples shown above:

• Feed Type: All Posts
• Description: Content feed – Feed that contains your latest posts
• Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/feed/

• Feed Type: All Comments
• Description: Comments feed – RSS feed that includes the latest comments posted on your site
• Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/comments/feed/

• Feed Type: Individual Posts
• Description: Feed that displays 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 specific posts
• Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/title-of-your-blog-post/feed/

• Feed Type: Archives
• Description: Day – Displays the latest items in each archive
• Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/2016/07/11/feed/

• Feed Type: Archives
• Description: Month – Displays latest items in each archive
• Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/2010/11/feed/

• Feed Type: Archives
• Description: Year – Feed containing latest posts in each archive
• Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/2016/feed/

• Feed Type: Search Results
• Description: Contains the latest posts for a search query
• Example Feed: http://yourdomain.com/search/term/feed/

• Feed Type: Custom Post Type
• Description: Contains the latest entries 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 your site visitors know that they can subscribe to your feed. Place your subscribe button image somewhere visible …

(Promote your feeds!)

Finally, keep in mind that other website owners will only want to syndicate your content if you publish great content. In other words, you must provide high-quality information that will add value to their sites and benefit their users.

(Easily add great content to your site and get others to subscribe to your content with WordPress and 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 feed 🙂

RSS Resources:

• RSS Images – Visit Iconspedia or search online (e.g. “free RSS icons”, “rss logos”, etc.) for sites that allow you to download RSS graphics.
• RSSBoard.org – The RSS Advisory Board Go here to learn more about RSS.
• Wikipedia/RSS – General information about RSS.
• WordPress.org – Official WordPress documentation. Visit this site to learn more about using RSS feeds in WordPress.

Congratulations! Now you know 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 via RSS.

Hopefully, this article has given you a better understanding of problems that can affect your web site and how WordPress can help you build a better business online. To learn more about the benefits of using WordPress for a business website or blog please click on links to visit our related posts section.

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