RSS: Are marketers missing a trick?

Ever since Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone, marketers typically haven’t been slow in using new technologies to keep customers informed. So it’s a bit surprising that RSS remains a niche tool.

RSS is a text stream of structurally formatted updates, so that software can identify information like headlines, summaries and dates. It’s most closely associated with news Web sites and blogs because they change frequently. Indeed, Google’s Blogger automatically creates an RSS feed for each blog managed using it. But RSS can be used effectively for distributing any information that changes over time.

An RSS reader or aggregator is used by subscribers to process these feeds. Apple and Microsoft have both incorporated RSS readers into their latest operating systems and there are many free tools available, including Google Reader.

The key advantage of RSS is that users can go to one place to see what’s changed across all the sites they like to watch. They can read full articles in their news reader, or just preview the text and visit the publisher’s site for the full story, depending on how much information is in the feed. The aggregator automatically identifies when stories are refreshed and marks those that are read so that they can be buried. It’s like having a customized newspaper that refreshes itself automatically, bringing your personal breaking news to the front page.

Because RSS feeds are just XML structured files, they can also be incorporated into Web sites as syndicated content or integrated with web services. New applications are emerging. Yahoo’s Pipes, for example, is a clever visual tool for combining and remixing feeds from different sources. It enables people with no programming skills to create simple data gathering and processing applications.

Although RSS is often thought of as something for news sites, eBay enables its customers to subscribe to search results they’re interested in, so that they can receive a customized update of new listings and closing auctions. Increasingly, the investor relations and press releases section of business-to-business Web sites are RSS enabled, too.

Many users will prefer RSS to e-mail because it puts them in control. They can start and stop feeds whenever they want. They don’t need to disclose their e-mail address or any personal information. And, most importantly, they choose when to log in and read the news rather than having e-mails piling in while they’re trying to work. That will make them more receptive to the messages when they receive them. It will also result in a more even flow of clickthroughs to the feed publisher’s site, compared to e-mails, which are often received by a large list within a short time window.

RSS could be a good way to reactivate customers who have tired of e-mail and are losing trust in it as a news medium. There are no deliverability or spam problems with RSS, although there is a greater barrier to climb in getting people to opt in. Education is the key. Marketers should seize the initiative and help introduce customers to RSS and aggregators, so that they can ensure there is a clean channel for communication in future.

For press releases and investor relations, there is a strong case for introducing RSS immediately. Although perhaps only 5-10% of your audience is using RSS, those people are likely to be key influencers and ambassadors. Investors and journalists tend to be early adopters of new technologies for gathering and organizing information. We’re already seeing many companies using RSS for reaching these audiences. Any business that has a strong following among bloggers should also be taking RSS seriously. Bloggers are news-hungry and tend to be better informed about RSS feeds, because their own sites incorporate them.

RSS won’t kill e-mail. Not everyone will want to adopt another communication tool: even if it does save time elsewhere, it’s another thing to keep checking now. But leading e-mail marketing tools can now repurpose the content from e-mails for distribution via RSS automatically. Some marketers will be too scared to experiment, fearing that users will opt for RSS instead of e-mail and they will lose control of the process and those vital demographic details. It’s more likely that RSS will entice new people to communicate with a business, and while some will switch from e-mail to RSS, the core of e-mail recipients will remain untouched.

Curt Bloom is managing director, international of Bristol, U.K.-based smartFOCUS, a supplier of enterprise marketing management software for direct and database marketing.