Feedburner on The Page, Regardless of Stats
20 Feedburner provide a free service, whereby they monitor a number of stats about your RSS feed, as well as offer a few other tweaks (Like the email subscription option we offer here). All of these services are fantastic, yes, but arguably the coolest offering Feedburner has is the little subscriber count button. But what do you do when you don’t want your readers nosing into those stats?
NB – This method will only work for WordPress users.
Why Is the Subscriber Count Button Useful?
- The statistic itself is a valuable one. The subscriber count tells you how many people have decided that what you write on your blog is important enough for them to read it regularly. There are many other ways of judging a site’s success, each with their own drawbacks, but for a blogger, what could be better than knowing that someone out there considers your writings to be worth reading?
- The statistic itself is a small one. Yes, knowing the number of subscribers is very important information, but it is still only one statistic. I don’t mind logging into Google Analytics every few days because I can access a huge number of different statistics all in one place, but logging into Feedburner just to get this one number? No thanks. You aren’t likely to want to do that very often, so having the button somewhere you see regularly is much more convenient. (We’ll leave Feedburner’s “Reach” statistic for another day)
- The statistic itself is a motivating one. You know the feeling? The one where you just don’t know what to write about, how to write it, or if it’s even worth the effort. There are many articles online about getting over writer’s block, but for me, the most effective has always been the ability to look over at that little orange button, and realise that people want me to write for them.
How Do I Show It To Just Myself?
First of all, you’ll need to set up the button at Feedburner. It’s very easy to do. Make sure that you’ve signed up to Feedburner already, and “burnt,” you feed. Once you’ve done that, load your feed’s dashboard, click the “Publicize” tab, and then the “FeedCount” link from the menu bar on the left. Select your display options, and finally, click “Activate” at the bottom of the page.
You will be shown a box which says, “Copy This HTML.” Copy (Surprisingly!) the HTML code in this box, and paste it into your theme’s files, wherever you want to place the button.
You now need to one line above your Feedburner code, and one line below it, so that the result looks like this:
<?php if ( current_user_can('manage_categories') ) : ?>
~Feedburner code here~
<?php endif; ?>
The button will only be shown to logged in users, with the ability to manage categories (Usually only administrators). WordPress is extremely flexible, offering countless ways to personalise your blog, e.g. Perhaps you want all authors of the blog to see the button? In that case you would change “manage_categories” to “publish_posts.”
As an example, you can see how the bottom of the sidebar on this site appears to me. (It looks just like that. I swear!)
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Wow thanks for the information. It’s stuff like this which I wish I would have known when I was a newb!
lol Adnan – Well, I’ll gladly swap my invisible feed count for your massively high one? ;)
*jealous*
Thanks for the info. I didn’t know that was possible.
You say you use feedburner. However, when I hover over you rss graphic, it doesn’t point to feedburner like most sites do.
Can feedburner still track that rss feed?
Is there any special setup for it to work that way?
Hi Dave – Yep, Feedburner is still tracking that link. Google bought the company not long ago, and shortly after, they released all of the previously paid-services, for free, including one called MyBrand.
It can be a little difficult for some to set up, but depending on your host, it’s a very simple process really. You can see the Feedburner FAQ for it here.
Click the “MyAccount” link when you sign in to Feedburner, and MyBrand is listed on the left. (If it’s something you’d be interested in doing, I could easily write up some help guides if need be. :) )
What? Log in to access your subscriber count? I just use a Feedburner widget for Yahoo Widgets:
http://widgets.yahoo.com/gallery/view.php?widget=39657
redwall – That’s a good idea as well. I’d never seen that widget before, so thanks. :)
I don’t use Yahoo widgets though. This method is easier for me personally.
Great tip Adnan. Thanks a lot
Glad you liked the tip Karen, but Adnan is actually my friend from Blogtrepreneur. My name is Michael. :D
Sorry Michael. I think I must be a bit punch drunk today.
Thanks for visiting my blog, although I don’t think the focus of Scraps of Mind is likely to be your cup of tea. I like your style here and you’ve got some great articles.
No problem Karen. I guess it might not be, but your post on good publishing technique was. I’m glad I found that article at least. :)
Nice tip there. Although I think that you shouldn’t show your subscriber count until you get 50 or more.
Sly from Slyvisions.com
Sly, I agree (Personally, I’m waiting until over 100. The third figure really makes the number look a lot bigger. :) )
That’s the point of this tip. It hides the button from everyone but you.
Like feedburner so like ur article :) Thnx alot :)
Thnx alot for that nice post :)
Like this article :) thnx alot mate :)
This is awesome, I will use it in my next project.
Great tip Adnan. Thanks a lot
Thanks for the info. I didn’t know that was possible.
Cool post, thanks a lot.