For a long time, SEOmoz's RSS feed has been full text - the entire content of every post (minus images, polls & embedded video) has gone out to readers that subscribe through a feed format. According to Feedburner, a majority of our blog readership accesses the blog in this manner - we average a bit over 4,000 feed subscribers, get about 5-600 clickthroughs from feed listings and have only 1-2,000 readers accessing the blog & tracker page on any given day (excluding direct surfing through SEs or links to blog posts).
Danny Sullivan recently wrote about his feelings on full text vs. partial RSS feeds:
Geez -- you're not generous or benevolent because you don't provide a full feed? That's a bit much, don't you think? You've inconvenienced someone with a click, and that makes you stingy or mean?
My reasons for not having published full feeds to date are simple. People steal your content...
...My best advice for those sticking with summary feeds is simple: watch your titles and descriptions. Posts will live and die by them. I feel readers will click through if you tell them what to expect. But too many blogs have non-descriptive titles or summaries that don't cover what the post is about.
Want to see some good examples? Check out SEO Book, then look the summaries of items as shown in the feed. Usually, Aaron spends a good deal of care making sure he puts out a description especially written for those who take his feeds. He writes a post, then he writes a separate description for it. I appreciate that as a reader, and I often click through.
I'm in a similar boat. SEOmoz's feeds get posted on lots of splogs and I certainly don't have the time to send legal notices out to everyone. We also don't get nearly the level of comment participation and community through feed readers, who click through infrequently and comment even less. Since interaction and community are such a huge part of what SEOmoz is about, and because our new model may have some monetizable elements (and I don't want to place ads in the feed), we may be switching over to a partial text, summary-style feed.
Trust me when I say that I want to be as generous as possible with SEOmoz's content and make it accessible to people, but I also know how important the elements of interaction, commenting, and seeing the full content in its proper format can be. It's tough to weigh the positives and negatives, but I think it is worth a vote:
Thanks for your input - it goes a long way into helping us make these decisions :)
You could certainly consider having two feeds. The free one - which is partial; and one with a nominal fee or part of a subscription - which is a full feed. I believe Feedburner allows you to set up a password protected feed, which might work here.
Interesting, though I can't say I'd be inclined to pay for content that I knew I could get for free by just visiting the site.
Is anyone out there offering a full RSS feed by subscription only? What's their model?
I am for full feeds.
I read SEOmoz pretty much every day. I read the shorter posts or the ones I am only partially interested in through my feed reader.
I open up the individual posts on the website if:
* its a longer post or I want to spend more time on it. * if I want to see what people said in the comments. * if I want to bookmark the post.
And to be clear, I look at quite a lot of stuff on the website.
Partial feeds would mean I would probably read less posts. And it certainly wouldn't make me comment more. I comment when I want to - not very often but that's cos I find commenting takes time.
I'd probably prefer to pay a nominal fee to get the full feed. But then I suspect this would put off a lot of people.
As for that survey - talk about skewed! I looked through the options about three times trying to find an appropriate one then reading Rob's comment confirmed it was a little off... :-)
Splogs drive me crazy when I'm tracking things via BlogSearch RSS feeds. However, and correct me if I'm wrong, but splogs will re-publish summaries and partial content as well, so you're really only putting a dent in the problem as opposed to solving it.
At the same time you're potentially alienating folks like me who often read posts while offline. Nothing more annoying than finding a really intersting article while on the plane, and having to wait to land to read the whole thing. I also use my feedreader as a searchable archive that I can refer to later. It's not helpful to do a fulltext search on my feeds if they're only summaries.
I'd be more than willing to play ball with a system whereby the full feed is protected by a (free) membership key.
Your poll does suck because you have three options to say you are in favor of it and only one to say you are not which is all or nothing.
I am not in favor of partial feeds because I have a long list of feeds to read and going to all those sites is not possible. What then is the point of RSS and feed readers if you have to click through to the site? If I like the content enough or if I want to read the comments or comment myself I will click through.
It seems to me a case of publishers versus users. The publishers don't want to use full feeds because people steal your content but users want full feeds so they don't have to click through.
I will probably not unsubscribe but I will probably lose interest and this is a blog I read everyday. I rarely go to Aaron Wall's site to see what he has to say and I hate his feed. I think you will lose a lot of readers over this.
I've subscribed to a lot of feeds over the past few years, and the only ones I'm still subscribed to are the ones that offer full feeds. I very often click through to leave a comment, but I don't have time to read a summary, decide if I want to read the whole thing, wait for the page to load, realized it's not something I wanted to read, go to the next post, lather, rinse, repeat. Unless the content is soooo compelling that I'll stick around even with a partial feed (and I haven't found one of those yet), I can only endure it for so long. I've unsubscribed from all the SEW feeds in the past, as well as good blogs like www.problogger.net. Just didn't have the time to keep up.
Frankly I really hate summary RSS. If Danny's only reason against full text is that people can steal your work -- then it's kind of silly. That's why the record industry resisted going digital -- and there are so many other ways to steal your work.
I often read blogs on my handheld on the way home. If it's just a summary -- I unsubscribe.
SEOmoz I read through an RSS reader, but I have A LOT of blogs to get through and having to click through for every article really slows things down. I click through when there's something I want to comment on, like this, or if there are important images I'm missing.
I think summary text is really un-customer friendly. I know you all are smart enough to be tracking RSS through feedburner or something -- so it's not like you can't see what we're up to.
With partial feeds, I doubt we'll get that many more people coming to the site than normal. Just like true fans of bands who actually buy the CD for the cover art, artist comments, etc...all the true SEOmozzers will still come to the site like normal. But I think for content stealing, partial feeds are where it's at.
Again, I submit that they'll simply steal the content anyway. They could screen scrape if they were so inclined. I think the RIAA/MPAA analogy is particularly apt ... by burdening ordinary folks with reduced functionality and cumbersome "protection", you simply angry those folks while not making a dent in the activity you're actually trying to stop (and possibly driving honest customers to dishonest means to ue the content in the way they want).
If Rand's goal is to increase comments and community, to build the social network here, there has to be a better way. If he's trying to protect the content, I think the answer is clear: Get over it. All protection mechanisms ever really do is keep the honest people honest ... thieves will always find a way around it.
If the goal is both, then the answer is just as clear ... give the community the features and support they want, and give them compelling reasons to come back. That likely means lighting a match under the people building the new site and then getting more content up.
I swear to God, the day I show up and have to cut a giant plastic shell off of the site in order to read the content is the day I ... well ... probably give myself a severe cut. Probably on the webbing between the fingers, too. That always sucks.
Because I'm such a swell guy, I added author and number of comments to our feed so you no longer have to click through to see those things.
Thanks Matt - you're a real pal :) How does the comments work with the feed - do they update as they come in? Wouldn't the feed always show 0 comments because it issues when the post is first published?
Good point - I removed the comments link for now and just left the author.
I vote for the full feeds. I've just switched to google reader and like G-man it saves me a load of time.
Otherwise, why not publish 2 feeds... a full one and a partial one?
I read most posts in my feedreader, but often times click on the link itself (I'd say proabbly 33% of the time) and go to the post page to read comments. I really hope you don't go partial because it won't give me that option.
Since you're using feedburner, add the "How many comments" snippet to the bottom of the feeds - it makes it much easier and compels me to click on the site to a. read comments and b. participate.
Since you're the origin of the article and have such trustrank in SE's, is splog duplicate content really that big a problem?
You should treat your feed audience a little differently the same as you treat email audience a little differently. It's a different set of expectations.
I made my comment on Danny's blog (especially as I signed the petition and was originally quoted in his blog post), and I still hold to it here: while it may thwart off some splogs, it won't eliminate them completely.
I like the convenience of reading SEOmoz in my feed reader and usually do click outside to interact (as in this case) or to get more information. But I have 89 feeds to go through, and with 300+ new articles a day, going partial is definitely an inconvenience, especially on such blogs that are must-reads like SEOmoz.
Caydel echoes my sentiments well.
I vote for partial feeds. I uses the LiveBookmarks in Firefox and only ever read a post if the subject line pulls me in. Plus, I am always for fighting against the spammers.
I don't have a problem with this at all. I actually sort of prefer going to the site to read the post and the comments. Especially on a well designed site like this. I also like to know who the author of the post is. That would be a good thing to include in the RSS feed actually.
For me, RSS is mostly a notification service. There's a new post, do I want to read it? If so, I'll probably go to the site. The full text only comes in handy on articles I only sort of want to read. I wouldn't read them at all otherwise.
Just to throw in my $0.02...
I use a feedreader specifically because I am trying to avoid going to every blog homepage to read the latest posts. I read 20+ blogs daily, and the majority of the posts I like to read in their entirety. if partial feeds are implemented, then that defeats the purpose of a feedreader for me - I may as well just have alist of bokmarks in firefox.
It doesn't matter much either way for me. I'd say give it a try and see how it pans out.
I really don't like RSS summary feeds. Unless a log is really good, I generally would unsubscribe if they only offered summaries. I think SEOBook may be one of the few ones I have (out of 150 feeds) that is a summary feed.
Remember, the #1 motive for anything you do should be making your customer happy. Don't worry about hits to your site, if your good, they will come.
I agree that partial feeds are a pain. However so are splogs.... So on that note... I don't know where I stand.
Partial feeds suck. I just started using Google FeedReader and it makes my browsing around to multiple feeds SOOO much quicker.
G-Man
You could always do something like have a subscription based model. Charge people $1 to subscribe and you could give away the $1 to charity (the michael gray needs a really big plasma TV fund is accepting donations). You could put a hash code on the feed url to let only paid subscribers get the full feed. To be really tricky you could say every third day put a randomified link in the feed that contains the hash code so when you catch someone republishing there no "oops wasn't me" deniability.
That's a fantastic idea from a technical perspective. It's something I've never even heard of before. Thanks! Not sure it would work with the paid model, but definitely if we use it in conjunction with membership or something... :)
Full feeds are just asking for splogs to steal your content all day long. But I am actually voting for partial feeds for another reason.
I agree that the comments on SEOmoz are very light considering the # of visitors you have. I think partial feeds will increase user participation if they actually visit the page and read other peoples comments.
At the same time I would like to vote for allowing comment posting for non members. I think that's another huge reason for less participation. SEOBook and most of the other industry blogs allow it.
Good call about the membership issue, Jeremy - I think we're actually going to set up a system so folks can literally register via AJAX right on the blog post page (no refresh), which should make it much easier.
Even now, signing up to become a member literally takes about 5 seconds. Enter your email, display name, password and bam: you've got a comment box in front of you.
Also, the login mechanism for the new site will probably still require a page refresh.
Even 5 seconds was too long for me. I've been coming to the site for probably a year and a half. I didn't register until maybe just a month or two ago I think. Maybe a little longer and even then it was because I needed to use one of your tools to test something.
And even now I hate the fact I have to log in to post a comment. For some reason FireFox does not auto fill the user / password on this page so I have to do it all manually. I know I'm lazy, but I'm also busy.
Being as busy as I am, the only reason I take the extra step to login and post is because I make myself. Awhile back I took a look around and decided after years of lurking around forums / blogs in this industry (since 1999 to be exact) and quietly doing my own thing, that I needed to step up to the plate and become openly involved in an industry I love. No more stealth ninja mode for me. I used to think I could conquer the world on my own. Now I know I can conquer the world in half the time by communicating and learning from others. :)
I know there are thousands of people and probably a great majority of our audience who are exactly the same. If they could comment more easily, we'd probably see a lot more contributions. We always find the same thing to be true in usability testing - make it easier, reduce number of steps and the conversion rate always rises.
Thanks, Jeremy.
I've noticed that with firefox as well - every time I want to write a comment I have to type in my email address and password. Then the page reloads and then I can type my message.
For some reason the 'Remember me' doesn't work. It would help to fix this...
We've had a few people report this problem and the new seomoz should fix it.
That'd be great Matt!
I am in for Partial Feeds, mainly for the stealing of content and other reason would be, mobile users. This was mentioned in comments on Robert Scoble's blog. Mobile users face problems in downloading full feeds as the net is slow compared to the one we have on normal machines. So if the post is lengthy it might take more time. But stealing of the content still remains the main reason.
I really liked the approach of SEOMoz, you guys don't believe in joing the bandwagon of "we want full feeds" just for the sake of it.
Regards, Deep
P.S. Suggestion, you can have a option in members panel where it allows members to choose, full or partial feeds and if member chooses full feeds, he will get it :)
I read the blog on RSS and don't have time to click most of the time. I would prefer to have ads added to the feed then only have part of the post on the feed.
I think that the answer here depends upon the goals of the site. Developing Branding and credibility dictates one model, if you are trying to generate impressions then another model, or if you want to accomodate busy people and those who like to discontect content from the web.... then there is the aspect of community. What do you want to maximize.
I would read opinions given here then make a check table to come to decision. Maybe there is a strategy that will combine some of these goals. You are not stuck with a single model?
Go with partial feeds. I always come to read the post anyway. If you keep putting nice diagrams & screenshots in the posts then its even more incentive for me to come and read.
I suppose it really depends who you target audience is. Personally I think this is a fantastic blog but I like having the choice to view you through my reader and visit the site if I want to view the comments on a particular post.
When you have 30,40 or 50 feeds you read every day, it's easy to see that if every blog used feed summaries then you're going to have to trim your reading list.
There just wouldn't be enough time in the day to go visit all those sites inividually.
I can understand the concerns about splogs, but the reaction (curtailing the way your real customers can access you) seems counter-intuitive to me.
I always come over to read anyway. This is because of the nice print style sheet you have. In the mornings I go through my feed reader list, open everything that is interesting to me, and if they have a good print out experience I print out the article. If not I unsubscribe from the blog. At least if it is more than a few clicks work to delete the layout (with the Firefox extension Platypus for ex.) This way I get about 20-50 pages to read for the day.
With all due respect, this is a bit of a push-poll. Three options supporting the decision (which it sounds like you've already made), and only one that suggests that RSS is something that will drive away people.
Rand has already said before that he doesn't really use RSS to it's full potential. As someone that does, I really don't have time to "read" all of the blogs in my RSS reader. Getting full feeds makes it possible for me to find out what's happening, get more information when I need it, and do it all in a minimum amount of time.
I do come to SEOMoz to post and read comments, but only once I've read an article in my reader. I'll state this for the record ... while I voted number 3, if you switched to partial text feeds, I'll be far less active a commenter, and will visit SEOMoz less.
Also, the "people steal your content" issue is bull. People will steal your content ANYWAY, and by publishing it at all, you run that risk. It's the cost of doing business. Why would you penalize what you've already stated is a majority of your readership to stop the inevitable? Did it occur to you that full feeds is the REASON you have such exceptional readership via RSS?
I think it would behoove you to rethink what the problems are you're trying to solve, and see if you can find better ways to resolve that problem. More often than not, taking features away that people have come to enjoy and rely on is not the answer.
Drop me a line if you want to talk more about it Rand ... we'll get a beer and chat about it or something.
Rob - you're actually kinda right about the poll. I should have constructed that more carefully.
Ooh, beer...
I had my SES San Jose post stolen and reposted by a splog, which was extremely frustrating because since the post was too long and got cut off in the SEOmoz blog, I had to convert it into an article. The splog posted my partial entry, which really irked me. Frowny face.
I second this. I'm so busy I hardly have time to read the blogs I subscribe to either. I hardly ever click through and read the ones that only offer partial feeds. In fact I deleted most of them from my reader.
I wouldn't unsubscribe from this blog because it's a valuable resource, but I would miss a lot of your posts.
I'm hoping you keep the full feeds.