Displaying your feed count
Aug. 8th, 2007 by ShaunThis post is in response to reading Dosh Dosh’s post, The Feed Count Meme: Studying the Impact of Feed Count on Blog Feed Subscriptions. Maki (the author of Dosh Dosh), says he can’t understand why beginner blogs show their feed count.
I know that I have been showing my RSS feed count since day one! And yes it was very painful when I had 0 subscribers, I was the first person to subscribe to this blog lol. I have nothing to hide with my feed count even if I haven’t broken the 100 mark for subscribers…yet. I don’t care if I only have 41 feed readers, to be honest I am proud of that and very happy that those 41 people found my content worthwhile enough to subscribe to my feed.
Blogs should be written and communicated on a personal level. Each month I like to share my monthly statistics for my blog that basically includes everything I know about this blog. It has my page views, unique visitors, the number of comments and more! So why not show my feed count at the same time? My readers can watch this blog grow and see my statistics go up and down. It helps generate good credibility as a blogger when you show your feed count. Displaying your feed count helps make this blog more user friendly and increases the blog usability.
I have nothing against blogs that choose to hide their feed count, and to be honest I have to agree to some degree that if you do have a low feed count that it’s best to not show your feed count. It is just human nature that people are like sheep. Humans only like to commit to something if other people are doing it as well. I don’t like to think that way when I am blogging. I like to think that my readers are subscribing to my site because of my content not because thousands of other people have already subscribed and that’s why I show my feed count. So far it seems to be working! If people are subscribing then this means I am doing something right.
Would I have more subscribers if I haven’t been displaying my feed count since day one? Who knows but that’s not the point I’m trying to make. This is more of a test to see if readers will sign up just because of my content.
Dosh Dosh receives a large amount of traffic so I’m sure this blog has a large RSS reader base. Here is his reason for not displaying his feed count:
Why I don’t Reveal the Feed Count for Dosh Dosh
The reason behind this is very simple. I don’t want the feed count to be an initial factor in motivating readers to subscribe to Dosh Dosh.
My opinion is that some readers are more likely to subscribe to a blog if it has a large subscriber base. This is probably because a large feed count somehow validates the readability and worth of a blog in some way.
While this isn’t entirely bad, I would prefer that readers subscribe to Dosh Dosh without knowing the actions of their peers, i.e. they subscribe to Dosh Dosh primarily because of the content and not because it appears to be popular with other readers.
Dosh Dosh doesn’t want his readers to sign up due to the fact that there is already a large RSS feed count. I don’t want to hide my RSS feed count because I believe that these 41 people who have signed up are doing it because of my content and nothing else.
In the end advertisers look at your RSS subscription count as a major role in determining the value of advertising space on your blog. If this is the case then we all better get our RSS feed count up 
. There is no right or wrong way to go about this situation of displaying your feed count or not. I would say that the majority of the “big” blogs that have more experience in the blogging world than me say that you should hide your feed count until you have at least 100 subscribers or even more. But I have no problem going in the opposite direction of this. I hope this will help gain my readers trust and increase my credibility as a blogger.
Do you display your feed count? If so how many subscribers do you have? If you don’t show your feed count when is the right time to stop hiding and display your feed count?
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August 8th, 2007 at 12:59 pm
To some degree I can agree with you both. I decided when I started not to display my feed count and as of yet I have not. I’m undecided as to what I will do when I get to a larger number, but that time is approaching fast so I’ll be thinking about it.
August 8th, 2007 at 2:05 pm
I can’t agree with You this time. Showing RSS count with less than 50 subscribers isn’t ok. I know You are proud of every one subscriber, I’m too, but showing small numbers only tells new visitors that Your blog is new or content is poor. This is my opinion.
August 8th, 2007 at 2:39 pm
Showing small numbers certainly does not mean your content is poor, and so what if it is new? People subscribe usually because of good content and look for things to come
I agree in a sense that it can hinder somebody subscribing similar to how I think it could hinder someone from guest blogging on a new site. I don’t show my feed reader ATM because I’m not proud of it nor do I want the world to know but it doesnt mean its ‘not ok’
Just my $00.02 and of course nothing personal
Cheers,
Glen
August 8th, 2007 at 10:25 pm
that true, i was showing it from day one, but thankfully i wasn’t my first subscriber but i was 49-50 haha
August 9th, 2007 at 2:32 am
I think if its your blog, you do what you want :c). I have been debating this for my own blog for a while. At first I was thinking based on articles such as Dosh Dosh’s not to show it. But just like you Shuan, I am proud and I was proud when I saw I was at 2 (because I was first on mine too! LOL). There is no right or wrong, show it if you want and don’t show it if you don’t want to, I guess I go with both of your opinions. And so what if I’m new and my count is low? I am a newbie and all bloggers started at 0 RSS readers in the beginning too!
August 9th, 2007 at 3:43 am
I like the idea about being open how popular you are, and it’s always a good way to see how many people just read and how many people comment.
I think I will do the monthly update and look back idea on my blog, thanks for the tip !
August 9th, 2007 at 12:40 pm
I displayed my feed count right from the start when it was still at 0. Nothing to be ashamed about really. I wish there was a way to find out who my first 50 subscribers were so I could thank them properly.
Your point about appreciating your readers is spot on. 50 or 5000, it doesn’t matter. They’re all precious. Great post buddy.
August 9th, 2007 at 1:46 pm
At the moment I’m not showing my feed count, even though I’d like to, I made a decision to only display it once it gets to 50. Right now its jumping up and down between 15 and 20. But I guess it doesn’t really matter. Maybe I’ll show it a little earlier.
Simon
August 9th, 2007 at 3:24 pm
thanks for sharing that! hopefully you reach 50 soon
August 9th, 2007 at 4:02 pm
I can see both sides. I’m surprised that Dosh Dosh hasn’t publicized his feed count - I feel that’s big of him in a way. Many of the big guys would wear their feedcount proudly and perhaps mostly because it’s a great promotional angle to say “This is a popular site!”.
Showing a feedcount even at “low” numbers could encourage others to subscribe (maybe they feel like part of the group) but also most humans tend to gather in flocks anyways…so it deter them from subscribing till others are doing it.
Who knows…. I think it’s personal preference. You gotta watch it though, for a small site to lose 10 readers is huge compared to the bigger sites, and it’ll show.
August 10th, 2007 at 3:20 am
For some reason I tend to “not subscribe” to those blogs that doesn’t publish his/her feed counts (unless if i find the site to be undeniably interesting)… By not publishing the feed count, it gives me the impression that the blog owner is just not confident with the amount of readers he/she has. I don’t really care if a blog has subscribers below 10… what matters is how passionate and honest the owner is in publishing his contents.. Afterall, a small amount of subscriber readership only means that its a new blog.. it does not necessarily mean the blog is not interesting
Just my 2 cents..
April 20th, 2008 at 10:08 am
I think it’s really up to the blogger whether he wants to show his feed subscribers. But for me I don’t show because that’s what I have learned. I usually try to follow tried and tested ways unless I know it really works otherwise.
Peter Lee
Work From Home Business Blog