“Won’t RSS Feeds rob your site of traffic? Matanong lang. nyaha.”

This was an interesting question brought up by Choldmhist which he left as a comment on my post “Setting up RSS on Your Blog”.

RSS has proven to be a really helpful and useful feature to bloggers over the past years. Instead of scanning through your blogs for updates, RSS makes a life easier by automatically sending all the content of a reader’s favorite blogs to a feed reader of their preference.

(Don’t know what I’m talking about? Learn more about RSS and Feeds here!)

There is only one slight drawback in using RSS, however. Readers are less inclined to visit blogs because they already have the content being sent to them automatically. In other words, they have no other reason to visit your blog anymore.

So regarding Choldmhist’s question, yes, RSS does rob a blog of its visitors.

Aha! So it was you who has been robbing my blog! To think that we trusted you!

So, why are other blogs insisting of having RSS when it has a negative effect on a blog’s visit rate? Why is Pinoy Blogero still offering those free customized feed buttons when he already knows the harm that RSS can bring to blogs?

RSS does have its disadvantages. However, this is just a small drawback compared to the benefits that can be acquired by using this. Aside from the chance of converting visitors to loyal readers through RSS, it is also considered the basis of a blogs growth and status today.

So, how can we be able to put up an RSS feed without worrying that all your visitors will be snatched away by it? We can solve this problem through a variety of methods which I have listed below.

• Remind your feed readers to visit your blog – You can do this by leaving a small reminder at the end of your posts or on your sidebar.
• Ask your feed readers to leave a comment – The only way for your readers to comment on your posts is through your blog. Make sure they have something to comment on.
• Offer partial feeds – by offering partial feeds, readers have no choice but to visit your blog if they want to read the rest of your entries. Many people don’t like partial feeds, though.
• Give them a reason to visit your blog – Think of any gimmick. Hold contests, change your blog’s layout, conduct a survey/poll anything that can make them visit your blog.

So before you go hitting your RSS with a bat (Or threatening it with a rocket launcher), think again. Even if it is sapping the life out of your blogs, you could still get back your visitors with just some simple steps.

Did you enjoy this article? Why not subscribe to my blog’s feed for you to get the latest posts here in Pinoy Blogero? You could also leave your own comments below. Happy blogging!