You might have noticed that in my previous post, Blogosphere Summary - Week #1, I have make a slight revert to the style I used to write my articles here, which is using the <!–more–> tags. RSS feed readers, don’t be shocked since you will still be offered a full RSS feed.
Drawbacks of promoting full article on home page
My intention to offer a full RSS feed urged me to stop using the <!–more–> tags in my blog posts. However, I found a few drawbacks which are listed below:
- Long home page. I am always not the fan of long scrolling home page. When I read blogs which are in chronological order, I sometimes don’t force myself to scroll down to the blog footer because it is just too tiring for my finger.
- Massive link giveaways. Links can be given in articles but having a full article on a blog’s home page is making the homepage giving away too much links and this will not only make my blog surpass the Google Webmaster Guidelines on the amount of outgoing links as I am a frequent link giver, it will also devalue the links I am giving out on my homepage, including the link juice I passed on to my top commentators.
- More showcase of work. Previously, I have too long articles on my home page before showcasing 6 titles of my other articles at the bottom of the page. The long scroll to the bottom has made these articles invisible to my periodical readers.
Photo by moriza
Anyway, I have come across a great plugin that will solve all the problems, letting me using the <!–more–> tags without offering a partial feed to by RSS feed subscribers.
<!–more–> Tags On Home Page, Not RSS Feeds Solution
The plugin that helped me in this will be the Full Text Feed plugin by cavemonkey50. This plugin is as simple as the No Self Ping plugin that I have introduced a few days ago.
You will only need to upload the files into your FTP, activate it via your admin panel under the Plugins section and you can now start to use the <!–more–> tags freely without having the fear that your feeds will be cut off halfway.
Importance of Full Text Feeds
Why do I need to care if there is a full text feed offered by my blog? If my readers want to read more of my stuffs, just hop over via the "Continue reading…" link.
Well, if they have the time to come over your blog, they might just leave your blog out from their subscriptions. People who are subscribed to your RSS feeds don’t have the time to wait for your blog to load or they rather prefer reading blogs via their RSS readers.
Photo by xctmx
If a full feed is not offered, these subscribers will not be clicking on the link, but will just unsubscribe from your blog and in the end, it will be your loss.
Feedback on Full Text Feed Plugin and Offering Full Text Feeds
Do you have this plugin installed to your blog? This is an indispensable plugin according to 6 Plugins No WordPress Blog Should Be Without by Matt Harzewski so install it on your blog immediately!
What do you think of the importance of offering a full RSS feed? Do you offer a full RSS feed on your blog?
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January 14th, 2008 at 12:11 am
I haven’t but I will.
I want to give the best comfortability for my readers so I give ‘em full feed. The way I’m doing it is by excluding “more” tags”, but next I won’t have to.
Some don’t agree cos it may reduce my traffic. But I think it’s more important to hand the decision to visit my blog or not, absolutely to my readers instead of making them do so by giving them only a part of information they need.
The more friendly my blog is to my readers, the more they’ll become loyal readers.
January 14th, 2008 at 1:00 am
Try this plugin:
http://www.dailyblogtips.com/h.....ss-plugin/
Automatically you’ll get excerpts on the homepage
Thank God you used the full text feed plugin, I just hated summary type feeds…
January 14th, 2008 at 2:20 pm
are you activate the plugin right now? because i found that the native feed reader by Firefox is still just showing one or two lines only.
while by using non firefox live bookmark, it will show full, i think it’s pretty handy, will install this plugin
thanks for recommendation
January 14th, 2008 at 2:53 pm
ahh…i did not know that it will be cut when you use more…anyway I do not use the “more” code on my blog
January 14th, 2008 at 6:59 pm
@ Louis
Yes, many have gone against using Read More on home page. I would like to experiment this for a while. If my contents are not tempting enough for my readers to click the link, I will resume to full article usage.
@ Ruchir
Summary feeds will chase users away for sure. If readers are subscribed to your feeds, they normally won’t have the time to visit the blogs they subscribed to one by one.
The only way to spread your ideas to these readers is by using RSS feeds and of course, a full feed.
@ jayhan
I have activated and a second check is being done. I don’t quite get what you mean by native feed reader by Firefox. Checks on Google Reader, Netvibes and Yahoo Mail reader all works well.
@ Rice Blogger
I am using the tags because I find that my sidebars are too short for a long home page.
Yes, it sure does cut off.