RSS for Revenue

1
RSS for Revenue

• ABM's Publishers' Summit
• May 15, 2007

2
RSS for Revenue

• RSS Reality or Myth
• What can it do for you
• What are revenue opportunities
• Other benefits
• Next big challenge for RSS

3
RSS History

• 1997
• ScriptingNews format, designed by Dave Winer at
  UserLand
• 1999
• RSS 0.90, designed by Netscape, for use with
  my.netscape.com, which also supported
  ScriptingNews format
• Plain garden-variety XML
• 2003
• RSS 2.0 spec released through Harvard under a
  Creative Commons license
• ThomasNet launches 50 RSS feeds
• 2004
• KeepMedia launches RSS feed making available
  12-15 stories from major magazines and newspapers
  such as The Atlantic, Business Week, Esquire and
  Variety.
• 2006
• WSJ.com Launches RSS Reader for Subscribers
• 2007
• ThomasNet has over 500 active RSS feeds

4
Who Knows RSS?
5
Who Knows RSS?

• Very few Internet users
• RSS is still not known among the general public
• Poor branding awareness

6
Who Knows RSS?

• Acronym
• Really Simple Syndication
• Rich Site Summary
• SMTP me and I will SMTP you back
• Just like the acronym RSS, most users dont know
  SMTP but they know their e-mail.

7
RSS Reality or Myth

• Confusing and conflicting statistics
• Forrester Research - just 2 percent of online
  U.S. households use RSS
• JupiterResearch - 12 percent adoption rate
• Pew - reported 9 percent

8
RSS Reality or Myth

• Closer to reality
• Yahoo! and Ipsos Insight found that 31 percent of
  online users use RSS
• But 27 dont know they are using RSS
• Appears as content on personalized start pages
  (e.g., My Yahoo!, My MSN, iGoogle) without an RSS
  logo.
• We dont talk about getting html anymore it just
  happens on our browser

9
RSS Reality or Myth

• PC Magazine Article 'Goodbye' RSS
• By Lance Ulanoff 11.30.05http//www.pcmag.com/art
  icle2/0,1759,1894072,00.asp

10
RSS Popularity Growing
11
RSS Popularity Growing

• Growing fast among publishers
• RSS allows for the simplest delivery of content
  to
• Web sites
• Aggregators
• Web Devices
• Becoming the default delivery method for
  subscribe-able content

12
Positive Effects on SEO

• Search engine ranking
• Expands links back to your site
• Propagate deep links

13
Expands Reach Beyond Traditional Users

• Viral growth
• Can appear on hundreds of sites
• Drive traffic to your site when users from those
  sites click on stories

14
RSS Popularity Growing

• Growing fast among users
• RSS allows for the simplest receipt of content
• Doesnt fill their Inbox
• Not SPAM
• Viable alternative to e-newsletters
• Web Devices such as PDA, cell phone, Internet
  devices
• Mobile predicted to be the next breakout
  environment for RSS

15
RSS Popularity Growing

• Growing fast among users
• Keep their finger on the pulse of their industry
• RSS can deliver
• News alerts
• Upcoming events
• New articles
• New tools resources
• Search results
• Revisions to technical documents
• Project management activities
• Blog posts
• Etc.

16
RSS Popularity Growing

• Growing fast among users
• Provides access to what they want, where they
  want, when they want in the device they want

17
RSS Advertising Growing

• Advertising on alternative media accounted for
  20.4 million in 2005, projected to over 750
  million by 2010
• RSS, blogs and podcast
• RSS
• Almost non-existent until the middle of 2005
  expected to grow to 129.6 million in 2010
• Blog, Podcast and RSS Advertising Outlook, 2006
• PQ Media

18
How Users Are Receiving RSS

• RSS is device agnostic

19
How Users Are Receiving RSS

• Finding your headlines on other sites

20
How Users Are Receiving RSS

• Web based aggregators are the most popular

21
How Users Are Receiving RSS

• MyYahoo!
• iGoogle

22
How Users Are Receiving RSS

• Growing number of feed/news readers accessing RSS

23
How Users Are Receiving RSS

• Google has its own reader

24
How Users Are Receiving RSS

• Growing number of browser access direct
• IE7, Firefox Apples Safari are RSS optimized

25
How Users Are Receiving RSS

• Part of the Windows XP Desktop

26
How Users Are Receiving RSS

• Even as a screen saver

27
How Users Are Receiving RSS

• Vista supports RSS
• Part of infrastructure
• Gadgets

28
RSS Ad Formats
29
As a Sponsored Post
30
As a link at bottom of story
31
As a link at bottom of story
32
RSS Advertising Offers

• Based on usage
• Package with existing newsletter or sponsorship
  offers
• Drive new ad offers/sponsorships
• Join ad networks
• Pheedo's geo-targeting offering
• FeedBurner Ads for Feeds

33
RSSs Big Challenge

• Metrics
• Still in its infancy
• Challenges
• RSS provides anonymous access
• Also syndicated on other sites

34
RSSs Big Challenge

• Metrics
• Basic tracking techniques
• Web logs
• How often a specific RSS feed is requested
• Provide a basic sense of a feeds success
• Tag
• http//news.thomasnet.com/newsxml/1
• http//news.thomasnet.com/fullstory/518151/rss/1
• Uniquely named transparent 1 pixel images

35
RSSs Big Challenge

• Metrics
• 3rd party options
• Feedburner, WebSideStory, WebTrends, etc.

36
RSS for Revenue

• RSS Is Real
• It can help you grow your
• Traffic
• Search Engine Optimization
• Revenue
• Advertising is possible in RSS
• Find users you could not before
• Metrics is improving

37
Thank You