RSS feed links placement...

Performancing.com have a good article on placing RSS feeds prominently.

When I wrote about increasing the usability of RSS feeds, I came up with a four step plan, but I didn't cover placement of the link:

1. Use a 'SUBSCRIBE' button.
2. Include a help button with help page.
3. Include a link to your feed in the head of your html.
4. Style your feed.

I always place my feed links prominently, but it didn't occur to me a the time to mention it. Perhaps it should have been a five step plan!

5. Place Subscribe and Help button prominently. :P

According to Yahoo!'s quite recent RSS white paper:

When asked to describe what they thought about RSS in their own words, 24% of "Aware RSS Users" mentioned "ease" or "convenience" as the leading benefit. In addition, 18% claim they value the ability to choose what they want to read. Intriguingly, only 7% mentioned the continuous updating of RSS feeds. These findings suggest that the primary benefit of RSS is efficient access to media sources.

However the report also says "Awareness of RSS is quite low among Internet users".

Prominent placement of RSS feed link with a help button brings RSS to the attention of your visitors, helps them understand it, and ultimately gives them what they want: easy and convenient access to media sources (that's you!).

Awareness of RSS is going to increase, usability will improve and adoption will take off. Now is the perfect time to help users get the convenience they are looking for: before it's available everywhere!