The importance of RSS

Just An Online Minute... Growth In RSS
Wednesday, May 17, 2006

A new report from JupiterResearch finds that 63 percent of big companies plan to syndicate content via Really Simple Syndication by the end of 2006. The report "RSS Comes of Age: Budgeting, Deploying, and Measuring RSS," indicates that currently only 29 percent of large companies (with more than $50 million in annual revenues) publish content via RSS technology.

Since RSS users are heavier consumers of online media than traditional online users are, they represent a prime demographic for online publishers. The Jupiter report suggests that marketers can either modify their RSS feeds to individual users through individualized RSS (IRSS) or create traditional broadcast feeds. IRSS feeds are subscriber-centric and created in much the same way as targeted e-mail campaigns, including all of the measurement benefits associated with e-mail marketing.

The growth of RSS is underscored by the fact that 48 percent of current RSS publishers are spending $250,000 or more to deploy and manage syndicated content. However, JupiterResearch has also found that spending at this level is inconsistent with the current rate of adoption.

"Despite low perceived adoption rates and definitive measurement standards, site operators are increasing spending on RSS deployments," said Greg Dowling, senior analyst at JupiterResearch. "In order to maximize their investment in RSS, site operators should leverage emerging tools and technologies specifically tailored to RSS."

"The primary challenge to greater adoption is a lack of experience with RSS and resources to deploy it," said David Schatsky, president of JupiterKagan. "However, recent offerings from e-mail service providers and RSS service providers are lowering the barrier for feed management, deployment and measurement."