What is RSS? RSS is a means of collecting updates (feeds) from blogs you like to regularly visit. It actually works for any website that offers an RSS feed (look for the 
icon). What’s also neat is that you can get updates of “searches” you regularly make. For this post I will use “blog”, but you can substitute website or favorite search.
How is it helpful & what does a “feed page” look like? Instead of going to each blog and checking for what’s new, back & forth, you look at your list of feeds to see all your favorite blogs in one place, in alphabetical order, on the left margin (like a blogroll) and the content to the right. You simply click the blog on the left and the content of the blog appears to the right. Move to the next blog and that one’s content appears. You never leave the page. You can race through all your blogs in record time.
What does the blog feed content look like? The feed content to the right can be just the headline of the post and a short few lines or the entire post complete with photos. There is a link to the blog post & the comments. And some other tools (more on that later).
)How are feeds collected? Since this post is for dummies, like myself, just go to Bloglines.com and Create an Account with an email account. It’s free. Bloglines is a feed collector (aka feedburner or feed reader). Once you validate your account, Bloglines suggests some popular feeds. Pick a couple to see how they look on your feedpage. Click “My Feeds”. As expected—the blog list is on the left margin. You will notice a dark number–those are the number of posts in the latest update. Click a blog from the list and see the content. Once you click the next blog, the previous one’s content is erased (don’t worry you can always retrieve it). If you don’t want it erased just check the box “Keep New” (these will appear as shaded numbers next to the future dark numbers). Similar to e-mail. Now you’re all set up to start collecting more feeds. But first, Bookmark Bloglines/My Feeds to your toolbar. Ready to go.
How do I start adding to the feed list? 3 ways. Option 3 is for real dummies. I naturally went this route. But just to seem smart, I’ll give you 3 options.
1. Go to a blog. Copy the blog URL. Go to Bloglines Home and click Subscribe. Paste the blog URL in the box and click subscribe. One or more “Available Feeds” checkboxes appear. Dummies just look for the most subscribers and follow the crowd. If you’re a smartie pants, preview and then pick an available feed. There are some feed options. Dummies usually choose Private & leave the defaults–smart alecks can play with the options.
2. Go to a blog and look for the RSS icon or better yet, Sub or + Bloglines rectangle and click it. The same sequence above appears, if you’re lucky. We unlucky dummies usually see a whole lot of code. Dang! The dummy way out is option 3, my favorite.
3. From your Bloglines feed page look for the “Easy Subscribe Bookmarklet“. It is also found via the Bloglines Home page & Subscribe where you paste the URL. Look for the “Easy Subscribe Button” link. Drag the marklet to your toolbar. Now once you’re on a blog just click that toolbar rascal (it says “Sub with Bloglines”) and bam! Now if that weirdo code appears just click the magic marklet and bam! There’s no stopping you now.
WARNING: Bloglines may be addictive and hazardous to your mental health. You may never leave your computer for fear the feeds build up. O my God, what hath technology wrought?
There are tons of other cool Bloglines stuff to play with but I’ll give you one dummy tip. It’s called “Clippings”. As you browse through the blog feed content you will find cool posts you will want to save. Don’t click “keep new” because they become hard to find. Instead check the “Clip this” box at the end of the post. Now you can save that particular post in a clippings folder. Just create and label your folders: Tech tips, marketing, best sellsius posts, etc. Retrieve them simply by clicking the Clippings Tab.
That’s it folks. No need for thanks, just subscribe to the Sellsius blog feed.
