RSS Feeds: Basics, Creation, and Automation

This article explains how to use RSS feeds to automatically notify your customers about new website content. You’ll learn how an RSS feed is structured and how to integrate it into CleverReach.

• What is an RSS feed?
• Applications in email marketing
• Create your own RSS feed manually
• Create RSS Automation

What is an RSS feed?

RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication. It is an XML-based format that functions like a digital news ticker. As soon as you publish new content, the feed is updated and automatically notifies subscribers via email programs or feed readers.

Applications in Email Marketing

• Full automation: Newsletters are sent without manual creation as soon as new content is available.
• Timeliness: Customers receive updates at the same time they are published on your website.
• Traffic Boost: Automatic links direct readers straight to your new articles or products.

Create Your Own RSS Feed Manually

To create your own feed, create a new text file (e.g., using an editor like Notepad) and save it as a .xml or .rss file. Then upload this file to your web server via FTP.

The structural layout (example):

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<rss version="0.91">
  <channel>
    <title>Your website title</title>
    <link>https://www.ihre-website.de</link>
    <description>Brief description of your channel</description>
    
    <item>
      <title>Title of the new article</title>
      <pubDate>Date</pubDate>
      <description>Summary of the post</description>
      <link>Link to the article</link>
    </item>
    
    <!-- More <item> blocks for new news follow here -->
   
  </channel>
</rss>

Explanation of the most important tags:

• <?xml...?> (Line 1): Specifies that the Western European character set of XML version 1.0 is used.
• <rss version="0.91"> (Line 2): Opens the so-called root tag of your feed.
• <channel> (Line 3): Opens the channel, which bundles all information and articles.
• <item>: Marks a single short article. Each new message requires its own item block.
• At the end of the file, the tags must be closed with </channel></rss>.

Create RSS Automation

As soon as your feed is accessible via a public URL (e.g., https://ihre-website.de/feed.xml), you can start the automation.

1. Click on Automations > Create New Automation in the menu on the left.
2. Select Advanced Automation and the template Send Your Blog Posts (RSS Feed).
3. Configuration:
   • RSS URL: Enter the link to your feed file here.
   • Frequency: Specify how often CleverReach should check for new content.
   • Recipient list: Select who should receive the automatic updates.
4. Link the module to an email template and activate the automation in the top right corner.

→  In our article Send RSS feeds automatically, you’ll find more detailed instructions + screenshots.

Help & Support

If you have any questions or need help, feel free to contact our service team at any time.