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Feedburner Helps Websites Understand Their Content

Posted: July 21, 2006

RSS (really simple syndication) has changed the way users and websites utilize the web. Whenever a new technology comes along that changes the way we interact with the web, new companies emerge to assist with the process and introduce even more new technologies that are built upon making these technologies usable. Enter Feedburner.

The next big thing is what makes the current big thing better

Unfortunately, I can’t remember who said that (and it might not be in it’s exact form), but that is essentially what Feedburner is accomplishing.

RSS is a technology which allows publishers to push their content around the web. Instead of relying on email and newsletters to keep consumers updated with news or features, RSS puts consumers in control.

If one wants to subscribe to a website, news source, etc, then one can choose a Feed Reader (which one day will be as common a term as an email program) to organize their content. Essentially, it allows one to subscribe to information and then have it organized within a program (or website) and then new content will show up in the reader as it becomes available.

The main difference between reading via RSS and reading vs email is that with RSS the user is in complete control. Don’t want more information from the website? Just remove it from your feed reader. Your email address is never given to the website, so even when you unsubscribe, you don’t receive those annoying ‘are you sure you want to leave’ and ‘please come back’ emails. No co-marketing programs. No email spam. The user is in control. (FYI - my favorite reader is Attensa).

What Feedburner does is allow website publishers access to statistics and more control of their feeds. When technology comes into play that puts the consumer in control, it also means that publishers lose control. What Feedburner does is allow publisher to track RSS feeds, use RSS feeds in interesting ways, and help promote website feeds. They still let the consumer have complete control over reading and accessing content; however, the assistance given to publishers is very welcome.

One always knows that a business is doing well when it appears on CNN, which just happened to FeedBurner. What’s more interesting is how their content arrived on CNN.

Essentially Business 2.0 is a magazine that is closely tied to CNN Money on the web. CNN’s technology news section incorporates RSS feeds from the Business 2.0 tech section (i.e. content from Business 2.0 appears on various CNN news pages). Hence, the very technologies that Feedbuner is building their business upon are what promoted it to some of the top read CNN pages.

One of Feedburner’s features for publishers is called ‘FeedSparks‘. This is a program which helps publishers push their content around the web. It’s also the program Business 2.0 uses to incorporate their content into CNN. So, the very technology FeedBurner created is what helped with their own visibility. Very interesting when one is helping with their own PR by enabling other companies.

If you are a website publisher (or blog writer), you should check out Feedburner. They have both a free and paid model based upon the features you desire. If you are a consumer, I would suggest checking out Feed Readers to see how to control the content you are reading on the web.

It is also important to note that many feed readers are incorporated into websites and you might not even realize it’s a feed reader. Do you add content to My Yahoo? Use Google Homepage? Use Microsoft’s Live.com? If so, you already are using a feed reader. When you subscribe to new content, add custom content, etc - in most cases RSS feeds are what is pushing the content to you home page.

To learn more about RSS and Feedburner, here is some additional reading: