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Getting the whole picture, WordPress and Feedburner
By Jamie | September 17, 2007
Do you have a feeling you have more subscribers that Feedburner lets on? Maybe you do if you’ve not configured your custom WordPress installation correctly, like me!
What is Feedburner?
Okay firstly what is Feedburner? In basic terms its a free service that formats your RSS feed and outputs it into a range of other formats, which makes it easier for readers to subscribe to your blog .
But also, Feedburner can provide…
- Count the number of daily readers along with other stats
- Podcasting tools
- Insert adverts into your RSS feed?
- Turn your feed into a newsletter
- Notify other blogging services of updates
- Mix in your Flickr, Amazon and Delicious feeds
Missing out
On Terinea Weblog I have a big button to the left called “Subscribe” which gives you Terinea’s RSS feed which is formatted from Feedburner. Subscribe that way and Feedburner can produce its metrics, such as number of readers etc.
http://feeds.feedburner.com/terinea-tech-tips
If your using Internet Explorer 7 or Firefox you can also subscribe to Terinea’s feed by clicking the RSS button in the top left next to the web address. Up to last week this gave you my RSS feed produce directly from WordPress. Subscribing this way Feedburner doesn’t get its metrics and you’ve know idea how many readers you have.
http://www.terinea.co.uk/blogs/terineatechtips/feed
The Good
Still not sure what I mean? Take a look at these two diagrams, first one demonstrates how you should use Feedburner, the Good.
The Bad and The Ugly
How to insert Feedburner Feed into WordPress
You have two options here, you can modified your WordPress template by changing the code found in your header file or install an additional plug-in. Oh, and of course make sure you sign up to Feedburner!
Manual Method
<link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml"
title="<?php bloginfo('name'); ?> RSS Feed"
href="<?php bloginfo('rss2_url'); ?>" />
To something like this…
<link rel=“alternate” type=“application/rss+xml”
title=“Terinea Weblog”
href=“http://feeds.feedburner.com/terinea-tech-tips” />
Feedburner WordPress Pluggin
Alternatively you can install a plugin called FeedSmith. Although I’ve not tried it, it looks fairly straight forward and it means you can swap WordPress templates without needing to change the code in the header file every time.
Topics: Marketing & Social Media, Tech Overload, Web development & eCommerce |
September 17th, 2007 at 3:24 am
I wouldn’t trust Feedsmith. I’ve clicked on it sometimes, and it loaded the non-feedburner feed. I think that dampened my numbers for a while.
September 17th, 2007 at 8:35 am
Edward - Thanks for your feed back, would you suggest a different plug-in or just use the manual method like I have done?
Jamie