As a blog owner, or as a blog reader, how important is the Blog Email Notification option to you? As a reader of many blogs myself, I really love this feature - and find that I am disappointed when certain blogs dont offer it.
I always add blogs and feeds of interest to my FeedDemon program - that is the feed reader that I use - but I dont necessarily open that program every day, where I do have my Email open pretty much all day anytime that I am online.
So I do use and enjoy email notifications for blogs I frequent, and I also love the option to subscribe to the comments (so that you get an email whenever new comments are posted to a particular post). It makes blogging very interactive - almost like a discussion forum is, except that the topic is more controlled and focused.
(I am working on adding comment notification to this blog as well, by the way 
)
I’d love to hear your opinion on Blog Notification Options.
What do you think?
I have been using Aweber’s Feed Broadcaster since December ‘05. Having several email lists and autoresponders set up there already, it just made sense for me to use this feature over others that are offered to bloggers. It didnt cost me anything, was super-easy to set up, and allows me to track statistics and manage my list in the same admin panel where I am managing my other email lists.
In fact, I blogged about it when I first checked it out. You can see this post: The Feed Broadcaster for information on how it works, and a little brainstorming on ways you can use it.
I have it set to go out by email every two posts. That means my subscribers are getting the email update 1-3 times a week. I may actually have to modify that since I am blogging more lately, so your thoughts on that are welcomed as well.
There is a noticable increase in traffic & commenting when the updates go out by email, so I would have to assume that my readers enjoy the option as much as I do with the other blogs that I read daily or weekly.
The Feed Broadcaster is simple to set up using either plain text or some very nice HTML templates that they offer. You can also email your subscriber list directly through your Aweber control panel, the same as you would any other type of email list. This gives you a lot of flexibility and control - especially if you want to offer something to your subscribers, instead of just publicly on your blog.
In mine I have my photo at the top right, which is in a little sidebar to the posts listed there and contains links & info about my other sites (specifically interactive links, such as my related discussion forum).
I am not familiar with the other email-notification services that are offered out there, but questions I would ask myself when considering which program or set-up to use are:
- Do I own the email list?
- If I move my blog, can I transfer the notification feature without disrupting my subscribers?
- Can I email my list directly (not just via blog posts)?
- Can I add things to the outgoing emails? (customizable templates)
- Do I control frequency, and number of posts included?
- Is it double-optin, and can I edit those confirmation messages?
With Aweber the answer to all of those questions is YES. Besides, you can create unlimited autoresponders and mailing lists in your one account… so if you have multiple sites/blogs, it’s well worth the small monthly fee.
Like I said, I’d love to hear your thoughts on Blog Notification options in general, as well as Aweber or any other scripts/services that you have used. Lets hear some Pros & Cons!
This blog post was inspired by Blog Newsletters, by Paul Short at BlogLogic.net
12 responses so far ↓
Rick Wilson // Mar 22, 2006 at 3:37 am
Hi Lynn!
I think it’s an excellent idea. I’m sure most people will like being notified when your blog is updated. I guess the key is getting the “right” frequency of notifications (depending on how often you add to the blog).
To play “devil’s advocate” here … You have “Get Notified by Email When the ClickNewz Blog is Updated!” on your form. Now, is one allowed to email these people on the list for anything else IN ADDITION to the “blog updates” or is one limited to emailing “blog updates” ONLY?
I hate to admit it but my email marketing skills aren’t all that great, so the above scenario makes me curious.
Obviously, those of us that know you wouldn’t mind any extra mailings as we KNOW they will be full of useful info but others … Ya know how it is these days.
BTW … Did you get my forwarded email regarding your last “blog update”? Just wanted to let ya know of a possible glitch.
Ciao!
Rick Wilson aka CorpRebel
Lynn Terry // Mar 22, 2006 at 3:54 am
I did get your email, and I replied to it… I hope it didnt get lost out there somewhere! Let me know if you dont receive my reply.
You make a great point about my “call to action” line on the form. Honestly, I have never emailed my blog list directly… and just let it run automatically through the Feed Broadcaster. But the option is there, and it makes me wonder that I might reword that text.
I can see where some might abuse that feature, but I would likely ONLY send out an email that directly related to my blog - if I did at all. With the customizable template, I can pretty much add anything I want to already outgoing updates - such as promotions, images, links, etc (in the sidebar, for example).
Good points, Rick!
~ Lynn
Suzanne // Mar 22, 2006 at 11:56 am
I’d think it is a good idea to add this feature as long as the subscribers don’t mind possible frequent email depending on how often you update. Some people don’t know about feed reader programs and it’s probably even more useful for them. Wordpress has a pretty good free plugin for email updates at http://watershedstudio.com/portfolio/software/wp-email-notification.html
Herman // Mar 22, 2006 at 7:27 pm
Hi Lynn,
I’m just starting a blog so am interested in your blog development.
I would not want email notification as I get too much email as it is plus there are many ways already to access the blog ie favorites, rss, shortcuts on desktop.
Questions:
Do you recommend placing Adsense Ads on my blog already or wait until I get some traffic going?
How did you decide to give your blog it’s own domain name instead of using a subdirectory of your main site..something I have been indecisive about?
How do you make best use of RSS feeds? I use Word Press also but wonder if it’s worthwhile to add RSS buttons as you have.
Thanks
0322061 Sharon and Roy Montero // Mar 23, 2006 at 1:38 am
Hi Lynn,
We use the LiveLines - Firefox Extension to subscribe to RSS feeds.
Nothing could be easier.
We are immediately alerted that a particular page we are viewing has an RSS feed by the RSS button that appears right next to the page’s URL in our browser’s address bar.
We simply click on it and the feed is added to our Bookmarks AND a new page opens up with our Web based RSS aggregator Bloglines.com for us to simply click just one more button and the feed is included there as well.
Nothing could be easier, oh, but we already said that.
As for eMail notification, that is not something that we want to subscribe to for EVERY one of our 300+ feeds.
But there are a good two dozen or so feeds that we monitor with an eMail notification as well and we do so with not two dozen or so eMails but with just ONE eMail. We use the free blog eMail notification service, FeedBlitz, to consolidate all blogs into one daily eMail message.
Lynn, this would be the perfect solution for you to use when the blog you’d like eMail from doesn’t provide it for you. Don’t you just love the blogosphere and Web 2.0?
Lynn, where is your link to subscribe to your RSS feed for the comments?
We’re sure that your subscribers would want to include the comments as well, that way they will know when someone has replied to one of their comments or not because unlike forums that automatically notify you via eMail when their are new posts in the thread that you have just posted, your blog posts aren’t set up that way, so checking the comments feed is a quick way to know if there are any replies to questions you may have asked.
One last thing Lynn, we are requesting that you increase your recent posts count to at least 100 because the default of 10 is just not enough for us and we certainly don’t want to miss any of your posts.
To change this setting, just set your [Reading Options] from the Options >> Reading >> Syndication Feeds >> Show the most recent: posts page to 100. Thank You!
Your Friends,
Sharon and Roy Montero
SEO & Blog Consultancy — For Your Free One Hour Coaching Call
Please Phone 760-378-2539 — 12:00 PM to 9:00 PM (Pacific Time)
Teli Adlam // Mar 23, 2006 at 4:01 am
Though some would say e-mail is going out of style, I have my own version of blog updates in the form of a weekly newsletter.
It allows people to sign up to receive my weekly newsletter coupled with my take on the blog entries I published during the week.
I know that I personally enjoy receiving e-mail notifications for certain blogs whenever they’re updated (usually once a day) as I don’t always check all my web feeds every day.
For the OptiNiche blog, I use a heavily modified version of the E-mail Notification Plugin and it allows me to e-mail individual entries to subscribers or e-mail them directly.
For my business blog, I use Aweber, but haven’t tested out the feed broadcast function. I’m pretty much running the newsletter as I do with my OptiNiche blog - manually writing the newsletter and mailing it out.
Lots of creative uses left for newsletters on blogs and new entry notifications via e-mail.
~ Teli
Lynn Terry // Mar 23, 2006 at 9:28 pm
Great suggestions, Sharon & Roy - Thanks!
If you plan to integrate Adsense into your blog template or theme, then you will probably want to go ahead and set it up initially. In fact, I dont see any reason to wait…
This is going to depend on your specific objectives or goals, and some thought should be put into it in my opinion.
There are a lot of ways that you can use RSS on a traditional website. On mine for example I have a feed for the Discussion Forum. I could also set my Archives page up so that it is RSS enabled - to allow visitors to ’subscribe’ to the newsletter via RSS, or through their My Yahoo! page. I could even add a “blog” there to discuss specific business announcements, ideas, site updates, etc. All of those I will probably do in the near future - and they are good examples of “on domain” additions.
With the ClickNewz Blog, though, I wanted to brand myself separately - and do more of a “behind the scenes” journal… so I chose to create it separately from my primary website.
Put some thought into it. And keep in mind that you can have as many “blogs” or feeds as you can realistically maintain
You can get those buttons free through http://www.FeedBurner.com . It is a super-quick copy & paste process - and it is a valuable addition for your readers, so I would highly recommend it. Different people are going to subscribe to feeds in different ways, so options are great. You have experienced RSS readers that have programs set up already to manage their subscriptions - and you have AOL users and everyday folks who use Yahoo for their start page… so offering those options is a great way to encourage a wide variety of people to stay tuned to your blog.
Herman // Mar 24, 2006 at 4:18 pm
Thanks for the feedback Lynn.
Are you adding meta tags to your pages ie each post?
If so, what plug-in are you using?
Lynn Terry // Mar 25, 2006 at 3:52 am
Hi Herman,
I am not sure the name of the plug-in. You might be able to find it in a search. It came included with the OptiNiche package that I got from Teli.
You might start with this search, or something similar:
Google Search for WordPress Meta Plugins
Hope that helps!
~ Lynn
Lori Wekerle // Apr 2, 2006 at 5:16 am
Still trying to get the whole blog thing in check. Have downloaded feed demon and can’t figure out how to use RSS for my site http://www.suzie-homemaker.com which has a lot of blog content. I also the gator one and am having trouble. When I enter the RSS code for PHP instead of HTML, it does not work. When I put it on HTML, it works fine, but my site is set up of mostly .bv php files.
Idea’s?
Lynn Terry // Apr 2, 2006 at 6:13 am
Hi Lori,
These questions may be better for the discussion forum. I am not familiar with .bv file types, but perhaps someone there will be able to offer more help on that.
I also wasnt sure if your web pages were published in RSS, or if you were trying to display content from RSS feeds on your web pages?
FeedDemon is actually a feed reader. Much like Outlook is to email, it is a program that you use to organize and read blogs and feeds that you want to keep up with… and I am not sure what “the gator one” is?
Meet me over at the forum, and we’ll take it from there
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