However, WP2.1 has changed things a bit. Since I use the more tag on longer posts, the nature of this has changed… not complaining

However, WP2.1 has changed things a bit. Since I use the more tag on longer posts, the nature of this has changed… not complaining

Everyday I have to really focus on just getting through my feeds as fast as possible, so 99% of the time I only read the titles. I don’t think you can get around having to always try and make the title and the first paragraph ‘punchy’

Everyday I have to really focus on just getting through my feeds as fast as possible, so 99% of the time I only read the titles. I don’t think you can get around having to always try and make the title and the first paragraph ‘punchy’

In my opinion your starting a post slow approach is bad as you only have a few seconds to get a busy and fickle reader’s attention

I totally understand that.. but what I meant about starting slow is that it presents a summary but doesn’t go into detail on some of the finer points, which might be more relevant and interesting for readers.

That’s probably one of the weaknesses for partial feeds. You can milk an short summary but there’s only so much you can include. Sometimes, it’s a specific hook within the body of the post that really grabs the user’s attention and makes her go, ‘I want to blog something about that!’.

If you only rely your titles and opening paragraphs, you’re giving them an either /or option. Either click through and read more or just forget about the whole post. Sometimes readers are undecided and giving them more juicy content leads to greater clickthrough and link potential.

Partial feeds have only one shot with the summary. If it doesn’t work, you’ve just lost an incoming link and reader for a specific post.

I personally seldom visit other blogs to read posts, because I do it all in the feed reader. Like many others, partial feeds can be very irritating because it’s inefficient from the perspective of a feed reader.

In my opinion your starting a post slow approach is bad as you only have a few seconds to get a busy and fickle reader’s attention

I totally understand that.. but what I meant about starting slow is that it presents a summary but doesn’t go into detail on some of the finer points, which might be more relevant and interesting for readers.

That’s probably one of the weaknesses for partial feeds. You can milk an short summary but there’s only so much you can include. Sometimes, it’s a specific hook within the body of the post that really grabs the user’s attention and makes her go, ‘I want to blog something about that!’.

If you only rely your titles and opening paragraphs, you’re giving them an either /or option. Either click through and read more or just forget about the whole post. Sometimes readers are undecided and giving them more juicy content leads to greater clickthrough and link potential.

Partial feeds have only one shot with the summary. If it doesn’t work, you’ve just lost an incoming link and reader for a specific post.

I personally seldom visit other blogs to read posts, because I do it all in the feed reader. Like many others, partial feeds can be very irritating because it’s inefficient from the perspective of a feed reader.

Skimming with full feeds is quite easy with Google Reader. You just hit “J” to go to the next post.

If full feeds are hard to skim that’s more of an issue with the feed reading software.

Skimming with full feeds is quite easy with Google Reader. You just hit “J” to go to the next post.

If full feeds are hard to skim that’s more of an issue with the feed reading software.

Some of my posts start slow but pickup with more heavy stuff so I like running full feeds. Don’t want some readers to not click through just because the opening paragraphs or titles were not entirely interesting.

I try to write my posts like I write memos at work i.e. assume the reader will be as busy as me, so I need to put an Executive Summary at the front so they can get the key facts straight away. I do this hopefully so that I can get their attention and get them to read the full post, and to also counter the need to have to provide a full feed becuase my the summary feed doesn’t provide enough info.

In my opinion your starting a post slow approach is bad as you only have a few seconds to get a busy and fickle reader’s attention

Some of my posts start slow but pickup with more heavy stuff so I like running full feeds. Don’t want some readers to not click through just because the opening paragraphs or titles were not entirely interesting.

I try to write my posts like I write memos at work i.e. assume the reader will be as busy as me, so I need to put an Executive Summary at the front so they can get the key facts straight away. I do this hopefully so that I can get their attention and get them to read the full post, and to also counter the need to have to provide a full feed becuase my the summary feed doesn’t provide enough info.

In my opinion your starting a post slow approach is bad as you only have a few seconds to get a busy and fickle reader’s attention

Some of my posts start slow but pickup with more heavy stuff so I like running full feeds. Don’t want some readers to not click through just because the opening paragraphs or titles were not entirely interesting.

I think it also depends on your monetization goals. If you’re heavily relying on contextual ads, you’ll need readers on the blog, hence partial feeds will have to do.

If you’re focusing on link selling, affiliate marketing and private advertising, I think it’s more useful to run full feeds in the long run.

Some of my posts start slow but pickup with more heavy stuff so I like running full feeds. Don’t want some readers to not click through just because the opening paragraphs or titles were not entirely interesting.

I think it also depends on your monetization goals. If you’re heavily relying on contextual ads, you’ll need readers on the blog, hence partial feeds will have to do.

If you’re focusing on link selling, affiliate marketing and private advertising, I think it’s more useful to run full feeds in the long run.