RSS feeds have a huge buzz factor right now in the search engine marketing world. Heck, they have a huge buzz factor in the world in general. It's no surprise, they are handy, fairly easy to create, and can be a powerful traffic driver. Many small business owners find the idea of setting up an RSS feed to be a bit daunting. They shouldn't.

I'd been playing around with RSS feeds for quite a while. About.com was using them back when I was a guide there, and Robert has had them running for Search Engine Guide for quite some time. I'd never been much of a reader of them until this past week when Matt B tipped me off to Bloglines. I'd been using Pluck and found it a bit cumbersome. Since switching, I've been having a grand old time starting my day with a read through some great feeds, all neatly organized. I can tell you that quite a few folks in the industry are getting traffic from me now that they wouldn't have gotten if they didn't have an RSS reader in place. Maybe you're missing out on some of your audience as well?

Bill Hartzer provides an excellent article today that has some background info on RSS feeds as well as some tips and pointers toward getting your own feed setup. Take time to read: RSS Feeds - a Website Owner's Friend in Disguise )