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Read it, comment, and share it with your friendsAre you using Google Reader?
A couple weeks ago I was finally on the lookout for my first RSS reader and I decided to give Google Reader a try. I liked the fact that it worked very similar to the way Gmail does and my search was done. I still don’t have much time to keep up with blogs via Reader but I’m able to check it every now and then.
A few days ago I heard that Google Reader does not report accesses to services like Feedburner. This is bad. Real bad. I know that for many bloggers (including myself), the whole reason for using a service like Feedburner is for having an accurate idea of how many people are subscribing via RSS. My subscriber count is important to me for two reasons: it helps me track how my blog reach is growing, and it measures the value of RSS based advertising (on Liquid Designs). I know Google Reader is not the first service to cache RSS feed content, but I would really like for Google to work with the blogging community to make sure that Reader reports correct data on feed accesses.
Proof of this, from Feedburner’s description of the Google Feedfetcher:
Google does not currently report the number of subscribers to your feed when it requests the feed, so the number of subscribers you have on Google home or Google Feed reader may be underrepresented by an unknown amount.
Just to get an idea on how much of an effect Google Reader has on Feedburner subscriber counts, I have to ask: how many of you (my subscribers) have moved from another RSS app to Reader? I ask because my subscriber count has dropped by over 100 readers in the past two weeks, and I have a feeling that Google Reader (and not my poor writing) is to blame. Please head on over here and let me know if you have made the switch to Google Reader, and also if you have seen a similar plummet in your stats on Feedburner. If the number is significant, I will definitely send a support request to Google asking them to fix their stats reporting. Thanks in advance.
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15 Comments
Responses to my articleA couple of weeks ago I started using Thunderbird to check your site’s feeds via Feedburner, I don’t know if it shows somewhere. Before that, I used to come to the site once a month or so.
Is there any good web based feed reader (I tried the Google one but didn’t recognize some of the feeds, because of the formatting or version, I guess)
(sorry, forgot the “?”)
Techcrunch had an old review of various web-based readers a while back, which I always thought was a decent resource… but it just depends upon what you like best to work with. Bloglines is very popular, but rojo has some nice ajax… and then I use my newsgator sometimes because it synchronizes with my cellphone and desktop. I use newsgator more than the others for that reason, mostly. I bought FeedDemon because of the synchronization in part, even! It makes everything much faster and impressive. I’d be lying if I said that girls have not been impressed. Anyways.
T-bird reports properly; it angers me hugely that google does not. I wonder about it when I check my feedburner stats, too.
How much volatility did you usually have with your subscribers, Christian?
Julián: Bloglines is the most popular web-based reader among my subscribers (Google Reader not included). It has no Ajax but apparently it’s very convenient. I actually like the way Reader works a lot, the implementation is very intuitive and flexible. It can be picky about subscribing to feeds… you usually have to put in the actual address of the XML feed, not the site domain. I just want to know if a lot of my readers have moved to Google, or if they have just unsubscribed.
Sam: Volatile? It was always give-or-take 30 or so. I could get an accurate number after weekdays when I had posted at least once, and even more accurate when I had posted each day for at least 3 days in a row. This consistent decline is not typical at all, and I have a feeling that it might coincide with the adoption rate of Reader. I hope.
I may be one of those missing subscriber - I use the Google customisable homepage thing (different to Reader IIRC), but it still uses the Google feed cache.
Sooo, so far that makes me #236 in your subscriber count (based on now)!… Hopefully more use it too………..
I forgot to add - I think this is how google/feedburner must’ve always worked , so that may not be the reason for subscriber count
Yes, but Reader became popular around the time my stats took a dive, so the timing fits.
I am coming from Google Reader since I subscribed your feed…
Read this very post in Google Reader. I’m enjoying it so far. Along with Google Calendar, GMail, Google IG, and Google Docs.
I was using Google Reader for a week or two when the new interface was released, but I switched back to Netvibes, which I like more for some reason. Right now, I’m subscribed through Netvibes.
It has gotten tons better lately, but I would never give up my desktop feedreader in favour of a webapp.
Personally I have no idea what effect google reader is having on my subscription numbers because, thankfully, mine are on their way up.
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I have switched to Google Reader in the past month.
To note though - I have not seen a significant change in the get a new browser subscriber count since the latest release of Google Reader. In fact, I have seen an increase.
I did not see ‘Google Reader’ in feedburner as a client being used to aggregate our feed. One thing I did see is the ‘Google Feedfetcher’, with the following note:
“Google does not currently report the number of subscribers to your feed when it requests the feed, so the number of subscribers you have on Google home or Google Feed reader may be underrepresented by an unknown amount.”
I’m not sure if Google Reader uses FeedFetcher but I do know this is what the Google Homepage uses to grab feeds.
Andy: Google Reader most definitely uses Google Feedfetcher… it also caches your entire feed from the day it starts fetching it and that is how it is able to load entries that are older than what is in you feed… two things I don’t like.
I really rather distrust the cache, myself. That’s just not playing nice with bloggers.
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