What does your blog looks like to your subscribers?
Have you taken the time to check how your blog looks to your subscribers? No! Do it – you may have a rude shock!
This is how I read your blog – through my Google Reader Gadget on my Personalised Google page. Your post needs to look good here not on your blog!
When I see Read more! I normally do not read more – hence frequently don’t bother reading your post. With the number of blogs I read I just don’t have time!
If you are really unlucky – your formatting (e.g. paragraphs, bullet points) is lost – dramatically affecting the appeal of your post.
Look what happens to slides from Slideshare! This looks like a blank post when in reality there is a SlideShare here. Unless you let me know there is a great Slideshare here that I need to look at I will not realise that I need to go to your blog!
If you have a podcast site you should also do the same. It was not until I put the feed of my podcast site through iTunes that I realise several of my episodes would not download in iTunes. Why because the name of the episode must be less than 64 characters (with spaces) .
Thanks Gary for all your help and taking the time to give us assistance – and explain what is happening and why – when feeds go through feed aggregator – we do appreciate it. And thanks Tama it looks like I do need the Any key.
If you liked this post I suggest you check out my post on What Your Blog Looks like in Different Feed Readers!
31 Day Chocolate Challenge Update
My task for Day 7 is to Plan a Week’s Worth of Blogging Posts. Yes I am an impulsive blogger however take to time to read Darren’s post to see why it is worth planning your posts.
What would you like me to post on?
Do you have any suggestions on topics you would like to learn more about? Is there are series you are interested in me putting together? I am open to suggestions!
18 thoughts on “What does your blog looks like to your subscribers?”
Well spotted, even more to look into on our chocolate challenge! (seems a much more fun title to use!)
Great point, Sue! I have my blog in Netvibes, but since I don’t use Google Reader, I hadn’t checked it there. I was relieved to see that it looks OK. Thanks for sharing this!
Sue, how do you do the instructions on the images?
Kate
Hi Laura and Michelle
I am glad it has given you food for thought. Michelle – other than my post with the picture next to the table are my posts looking ok? And does Netvibes automatically locate the feed using the URL or did you have to located it another way?
Laura – do you use other than Google Reader and NetVibes – if so can you answer above questions I asked Michelle?
Sue
Hi Kate
I use SnagIT – if you do a search of my blog you will find posts on it. You can download a 30 day free trial. Not sure if works on Mac.
Sue
Really hadn’t thought about that type of viewer. Do you feel that Google Reader is the most agnostic, or are there others we should consult? Thanks.
Sue, a very practical post. Funny that I was struggling with what my blog site should look like and as I thought more, I realized I didn’t really know what other bloggers sites looked like. Save a few. I use Bloglines so that was my reference for how my blog looks. Apparently, we should be saying how a blog reads. Thanks for the post and the meme tag! 🙂
Great post, and very helpful to actually see the contrasts. My usual process is to put a post up without a more tag, then when I post the next one to add a more tag into the last one. My thinking is that people who read in feedreaders are usually looking at the most recent posts. My customers, who are less likely to be blog savvy, want to see a selection of what is available on my main page.
I must admit, I have been using the more tag for my 31days challenge posts. They have been long, and my concern is that they are not of interest to my customers. In an attempt to not overwhelm them, I guessed that other challenge participants would take the extra step. But maybe I am making all sorts of wrong assumptions!
Hi Sue!
Question: What can I do to when I have a post with a Slideshare in it to be seen properly by others?
Hello Sue
Some really good points. I think I need to do more of an audit of how my site appears in different feed readers.
Although as someone who views most blogs through a feed reader, I had almost the opposite challenge. I’d been forgetting to check how my blog looked to people who just surfed in – and as a result was missing fixing a few bugs.
I know feed-burner offer a ‘feed health check’ for RSS feeds… but I feel I almost need to set up a set of tabs or bookmarks in a browser to run a periodic ‘full blog health check’ over key pages on the blog… (Homepage, recent comment list, about page, tags…)
Skitch for the Mac is an alternative to snagit or grab with a quicksilver command is another.
Like a web designer has different browsers installed to test the designs on. A blogger should test there blog feed on the major feed readers at least.
Hi Sue,
I noticed you demonstrated my site there 🙂
Since doing this challenge I’ve received so many comments about RSS not working that I’m embarrassed! Still trying to find time for bug fixing but thinking my best option is to change theme and/or reinstall wordpress.
You have definitely illustrated to me how important it is to thoroughly test your RSS feed. I used a reader, but that reader re-formats the feed, so I didn’t notice the problem. I will be running any future feeds through Google Reader (my favorite also) before going live with them next time.
Cheers, Kate
Hi Everyone
Thanks for commenting – I had also come to the same conclusion as Gary advised so tested my blog in several different readers today.
Results were very interesting. So readers could not find the feed. Here is my road test of the top feed readers for 2007.
Sue
I’ve had some of these problems on previous systems (Things like Fusionnews). Thankfully WordPress handles RSS nicely, and any errors are usually down to mistakes in your actual post. 🙂