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Switching from Feedburner to follow.it, and this is why

Google is killing feed-burner as the search engines giant didn't update it for more than 10 years. As a result, feed-burner became buggy and featureless when comparing it to the new feed management services. For this reason, I found my self forced to switch to another alternative.
The decision was hard as there's plenty of choices. However, after a long time-consuming research, I figured that follow.it (the ambitious newcomer) could be the next Linux-Tech&More "feed bunner", and that what was happening. Now, the question that you should ask is why? 
To answer this question, I must define follow.it, describe its features and express my point of view.
 

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What is follow.it?

According to the official follow.it website "follow.it is a service that allows Members to setup and subscribe to Feeds in order to cope with information overload in a better way."
follow.it is the successor of the ambitious SpecificFeeds.com which was launched on May 4, 2012. Today more than 118k websites are using its services. Also, it maintains 2.0+ millions active followers.
The ambitious boy is owned by Inisev Ltd a specialized company in SaaS tools & products for WordPress and beyon.

What you get as a follower/reader?

For followers, follow.it service is always free. And it gives you a lot for free:
  • All features are 100% free!
  • You can chose how to receive news: single emails, newspaper (one email per day), news page, telegram, etc.
  • You can add various filters including keywords, tags, authors to get exactly what you want.
  • Spam-free: your contact details are safe, and you can, at any moment, unfollow with just a click.
  • Bookmarklet tool & Mass follow: easily follow websites while surfing the web using the book by clicking on the bookmarklet tool button. Also, you can use the Mass follow option to follow a list of website at once or to import it from your other RSS reader app.
  • No room for mistakes: with double-opt confirmation you won't receive feed updates until you confirm your email. This means "no one can use your email without you knowing".
  • Consistent and straightforward UI design: Follow.it website design is simple, new and robust. And I guess you'll agree with me after taking a look at it! 

What I get as a publisher?

For a publisher, like me 😅, the service is FREE on the basic plan. However to unlock extra features a premium plan should be paid. However, the basic plan features is enough for most of publishers:
  • High deliverability: follow.it has an excellent sender reputation that means, for me as a publisher, that my feed updates won't be considered as spams.
  • Active followers: Double opt-in feature ensures that only followers who actually want to receive my content get it.
Source: follow.it
  • Multiple delivery channels: this gives my readers more choices and flexibility.
  • Powerful analytic: a good analytic tool means more optimization ideas that leads to an increased number of happy followers. No more comment needed!
Source: follow.it
Source: follow.it
  • A user friendly feed: follow.it services offers my readers a user friendly dashboard that helps them to keep their feeds clean and optimized.
  • High control over my feed (some features are paid): title customization, unfollow users, change feed logo...
  • Premium plan are "Pay for what you use" plan.
  • Premium Plans can be cancelled daily.

Bottom line 

Okay, I choose follow.it because it offers me and my readers a strong user experience. On the one hand, it gives my readers greater control and more options that are not available in the rest of feed management services. On the other hand, as a publisher, I can customize my feed and optimize it in a better ways compared to feedburner and others feed management tools.

So have you decided to follow me on follow.it?{alertIdea}
Djalel Oukid

Science teacher, PhD student, Master degree in Microbial biotechnology , Microbiologist, designer, video editor, podcaster & blogger. linkedin portfolio github

8 Comments

Comments are welcomed and encouraged on this blog. Spam, abusive and off-topics comments will be deleted. Please read our Comments policy before commenting.

  1. Thanks for posting this. With Blogger dumping its Feedburner I've been looking for an alternative, saw FI and have been looking for a decent review in "plain language". Most helpful. I've Tweeted.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks, I really appreciate that. Looking forward for your suggestions.

      Delete
  2. I have just started using Follow.It and although it seems good, many of my followers aren't getting alerts when I post on my website even though they have confirmed that they want to continue following me now I have moved over from Feedburner. Any idea what the problem might be?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The best solution is to contact help center.

      Delete
    2. @firecru with double-opt confirmation you won't receive feed updates until you confirm your email. This means "no one can use your email without you knowing".

      Delete
  3. I've been using the free version of Follow.it (as a publisher) for a while now and I'm not happy with it at all. Their logo is front and center of my content, it messes up the formatting of my posts (Images off center, text out of line, etc.) and it places horrible ads under my content (one with Trumps face, one with "the one vegetable that literally destroys you form this inside"- absolute garbage!)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yeah, the free version is becoming garbage.

      Delete
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