- More on Feeds
- Before Adding Your Feeds
- Adding a Feed
- Oops, Wrong Author
The time you spend now, in setting up your blog to take feeds from sponsors, is time well spent. It will save you down the road, big time. And I mean that, given that I spent most of today, fixing my stupid goofs, for just a few of the blogs, that I have added feeds to.
KEEP IN MIND, NOT ALL FEED PLUGINS WORK THE SAME. I AM REFERRING TO THE PLUGIN I USE, WHICH IS “ FEEDWORDPRESS “
Now earlier, we discussed setting up multiple ” authors “ to use to assign specific feeds to. Now that does make sense, and is not so time consuming as one would expect. In fact, it is relitively simple. For my own purposes, I have assigned them as “authors” rather than any of the other roles available. Just makes it sound better, though you could use any of the other roles, but I’d certainly NOT USE the ” Administrator ” role.
Another important PRE FEED STEP, is to decide on where you want the feeds to go, in your blog navigation. For example, you should place it in a category that is unique and not mixed up with other content. Just easier to keep track of, and find.
Myself, I am using existing categories, which in hindsight, I would have changed. I would make it a top level category, and something rather generic in name. A good example would be PORN or something like that. You also want to make sure its a good ‘category slug’ so again, top level makes a bit more sense.
You should also get together a small list of keywords, generic in order to add them to the feeds. It is one of the options available, and I suppose you can make them less generic, but then you’ll have to add them to each feed. Now, myself I am too lazy for my own good, so I just set a global set of keywords for all feeds I am using in my blogs. However, I do change them for each blog, so as to not compete with myself.
Now once you have added a feed, you do have some set up work to contend with. Feedwordpress for example will add each feed, to your links or blogroll. So BEFORE you set up any feeds, ADD A LINK CATEGORY to hold all of them in, or to list them on. NOTE » These will be automatically added to, with each feed, so I think it makes more sense to seperate them from other linking partners, such as for link trades. It can become confusing.
I’d use something that is not bland either, but not a tip off either. For example, ‘contributor‘ is a bit naff, and boring too. I’d use something like ‘other porn homes’ or something in that vein. Keep in mind, that once you assign feeds, you are still going to have to do some initial work, in making sure the links are more enticing. I mean many of the feeds get listed as twinkspay feed or some other banal crap.
Once you have added a feed or two, you should go and check them under the ” LINKS ” drop down, and alter the names to be more enticing or clean sounding. Like it really makes no sense to let the surfer know they are feeds. Kind of defeats the whole purpose, don’t you think?
Also, you should have all ” OUTGOING LINKS ” open in a new window. I know, many will object, but it keeps them on your site, if they don’t care for the feed site. And who knows, it might result in them (the surfer/customer) choosing another feed, and actually signing up.
Keep in mind, this is all in YOUR SIDEBAR. You really do want it to look as clean as possible.
Sep 15th by Malcontent