Friday, March 03, 2006

RSS or Really Successful Syndication

I like to tell publishers that adding an RSS feed is the best easy thing they can do to serve readers and improve their online offerings.
But until I read Matt McAlister's blog yesterday, I failed to notice just how easily one company has managed to become the RSS provider of choice for some powerhouses of the press.
As detailed on Matt's blog, Feedburner is conducting "a systematic conquest of publishers' RSS feeds."
Certainly part of Feedburner's success is due to the product itself. RSS is about the simplest function in publishing. And Feedburner has made it even easier. For example, I'd guess that I spent all of about five seconds creating my Feedburner feed, and that is about 1/1000th the time it took me to learn to operate my cable TV remote. Combine ease of use with upside potential and you have a product that any publisher would like.
But the most interesting thing about Matt's post is his comparison of Feedburner to IndustryBrains, the ad-serving network used by IDG, Slashdot, eWeek, Investors Business Daily and others.
Check out what Matt has to say here.
Or you can read some of my earlier thoughts on RSS here.

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1 comment:

  1. Interesting comparison between Feedburner and Industry Brains by Matt except for one thing. Feedburner is much larger than the tech publishing world.

    Prior to his post, USA Today and Reuters signed on. Since his post, Newsweek has gotten in on the action.

    Industry Brains = niche
    Feedburner = um, not niche?

    Peace

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