RSS feeds are a popular data format used for serving users frequently updated content and they offer great opportunities to publishers who are looking for alternative systems to generate revenue from their original content.

Photo credit: Kristian Peetz

With the growing popularity of RSS feed-based syndication, many Internet publishers became concerned that subscribers to their RSS feeds would not be be exposed anymore to the advertising on their web pages, as some readers could now read all of their content inside their RSS reader. In this light, some decided to publish only a short part of their articles in their RSS feeds so that those interested would click through to their site to read the rest of the content.

While initially this approach has given good results to those using it, recently more and more online publishers have decided to provide the full content of their articles inside their RSS feed not to alienate those readers on the move or offline who were frustrated by their inability to read the full content of the articles without clicking through to the main site.

In our experience, here at Master New Media, there is not a cut and dried solution which works best for everyone. It depends a lot on the type of content you offer and on the type of demographics your readership is made up of.

But then, and this is now over two years ago, some companies started to offer the opportunity to automatically insert ads inside RSS feeds. These RSS feed monetization services enable publishers to place ads inside their RSS feeds and earn money when these are read or clicked upon.

The revenue models offered by these RSS feed monetization services are different ones: they span from CPC, CPM to flat rate plans; additionally, publishers can choose between contextual text-based ads, banners and interstitial ads, which are often completely customizable.

In this mini-guide we have reviewed for you the most popular services that allow independent publishers that are interested in monetizing their content to generate an alternative revenue stream from their RSS feeds. While reviewing these services, I have identified the following traits as my points of reference:

• Type of ads: the typology of advertisement offered, whether contextual or random text links, banners, interstitial ads, etc.
• Every how many posts the ad is shown: the exact positioning of ads within the RSS feeds.
• Ability to select and approve the ads: the possibility for the publisher to choose which ads can be included and which cannot.
• Stats about ads performance: the availability of a control panel that allows the publisher to monitor the revenue and performance of ads within RSS feeds
• Rate: the method of payment offered to the publisher, whether CPC (Cost Per Click), CPM (Cost Per Mille – which estimates the cost per 1000 views of the ad) or flat rate
• Requirements: special requirements that the publisher needs to have in order to insert ads in her RSS feeds (which might correspond to a high authority, pagerank and number of RSS feeds subscribers)

Please note that this mini-guide does not aim to be considered an exhaustive resource of all the RSS feeds monetization services and tools available nowadays. The list of the items included in it is subject to changes and you are very welcome to suggest new items for inclusion anytime by using the Comments section below.

Google AdSense for Feeds

• Type of ads: contextual text links, banner


• Every how many posts the ad is shown: N/A


• Ability to select and approve the ads: NO


• Stats about ads performance: YES


• Rate: CPC


• Requirements: AdSense account and more than 100 active subscribers


• Price: free


• Link: http://services.google.com/ads_inquiry/aff

AdSense for feeds is a program that enables publishers to place relevant ads in the feeds they syndicate. Google technology understands the nuances of language, and places ads that are closely matched (or "targeted") to the content next to which they appear. If you are a current AdSense publisher and your feed has more than 100 active subscribers, you may qualify for participation in AdSense for feeds (which is still in beta).

Kanoodle BrightAds RSS

• Type of ads: contextual text links


• Every how many posts the ad is shown: N/A


• Ability to select and approve the ads: NO


• Stats about ads performance: YES


• Rate: CPC


• Requirements: NO


• Price: FREE


• Link: http://www.kanoodle.com

Kanoodle is a pay-per click network which includes hundreds of thematic ad categories from which you can freely choose. Through BrightAds RSS, Kanoodle’s content-targeted sponsored links will be inserted directly into site owners’ RSS feeds within posts or as individual posts, with relevancy of the ads assured through Kanoodle’s topic-based approach.

Pheedo FeedPowered

• Type of ads: text, logo & text, banner


• Every how many posts the ad is shown: this option is customizable


• Ability to select and approve the ads: NO


• Stats about ads performance: YES


• Rate: CPC


• Requirements: NO


• Price: FREE


• Link: http://www.pheedo.com

Pheedo’s FeedPowered advertising platform converts your RSS feeds into rich, dynamically updating advertising that engages your audience. Pheedo retrieves your RSS feed several times an hour and updates your FeedPowered advertisements with any newly published items. With Pheedo FeedPowered you can also monetize your syndicated video content.

TextLinkAds Feedvertising

• Type of ads: text links


• Every how many posts the ad is shown: N/A


• Ability to select and approve the ads: NO


• Stats about ads performance: YES


• Rate: flat rate pricing


• Requirements: users need to have WordPress 2.0+ as their publishing platform


• Price: FREE


• Link: http://www.text-link-ads.com/feedvertising

TextLinkAds provides a new service to bloggers called Feedvertising, which allows them to run text link ads in their RSS feed. Whether the ads come from TextLinkAds, your own in-house efforts, or your affiliate links the choice is always up to you. Feedvertising is currently available only for WordPress 2.0+ users with more blogging platforms coming soon. There are no variable CPM rates or cost-per-click systems: publishers get paid according to a predictable flat rate pricing.

MediaFed

• Type of ads: banners


• Every how many posts the ad is shown: this option is customizable


• Ability to select and approve the ads: NO


• Stats about ads performance: YES


• Rate: N/A


• Requirements: NO


• Price: FREE


• Link: http://www.mediafed.com/rss_reader.html

MediaFed is a service that lets you generate revenue from your feeds by inserting suitable advertising in the feed items. MediaFed ad placement system automatically inserts adverts into your feeds in one of two ways: either adverts are inserted every x number of articles where you control the value of x, or by matching keywords to your article contents to target relevant advertising.

FeedShow

• Type of ads: Google AdSense ads


• Every how many posts the ad is shown: N/A


• Ability to select and approve the ads: NO


• Stats about ads performance: YES


• Rate: CPC (FeedShow gives the publishers 50% of the revenues)


• Requirements: Google AdSense account


• Price: FREE


• Link: http://www.feedshow.com

FeedShow is a web-based RSS feed reader and first the online aggregator to remunerate publishers theough Google AdSense. Revenues are generated by clicks on the displayed ads. FeedShow gives the publishers 50% of the revenues. When displaying ads, both your Google AdSense codes and Feedshow codes are used, so that the number of ads displayed for the publishers account and the FeedShow account are the same. Google and the AdSense program will then pay the editors directly without any interaction with FeedShow.

FeedBurner Ads for Feeds

• Type of ads: text ad, text ad with logo, banner


• Every how many posts the ad is shown: N/A


• Ability to select and approve the ads: NO


• Stats about ads performance: YES


• Rate: CPM


• Requirements: NO


• Price: FREE


• Link: https://www.feedburner.com/fb/a/advertising

FeedBurner offers one of the most comprehensive advertising networks for blogs and RSS feeds available on the Web. Participation in FAN is by invitation, based on several variables such as how long FeedBurner has managed your feed, the number and consistency of subscribers you have,and frequency of content publication.

Q-Ads for Feeds

• Type of ads: text & video ads


• Every how many posts the ad is shown: this option is customizable


• Ability to select and approve the ads: YES


• Stats about ads performance: YES


• Rate: CPC


• Requirements: NO


• Price: FREE


• Link: http://adgenta.com

Q-Ads is a service that allows you to choose which advertisements to put onto your website or in RSS feeds by selecting specific keywords. You have total control over the advertisements your visitors see, because they are no longer bound to the content, but to your personal choice. Besides, there is no approval process or minimum traffic requirement to use Q-Ads.

Yahoo! Publisher Network

• Type of ads: text links


• Every how many posts the ad is shown: N/A


• Ability to select and approve the ads: NO


• Stats about ads performance: YES


• Rate: CPC


• Requirements: NO


• Price: FREE


• Link: http://publisher.yahoo.com

Yahoo! Publisher Network, you can put ads in your RSS feeds and receive a share of the revenue generated by each qualified click on the ads. You simply embed some code into the template of your publishing system and you will be served Yahoo! ads that may be relevant to a specific article or post, or to your content in general.

ThankYouPages

• Type of ads: full page interstitials


• Every how many posts the ad is shown: not appliable to this service


• Ability to select and approve the ads: NO


• Stats about ads performance: YES


• Rate: CPM and CPC


• Requirements: NO


• Price: FREE


• Link: http://www.thankyoupages.com/publishers/rss.mpl

ThankYouPages is a service that allows publishers to insert advertising into the links contained within their RSS feeds. When a user clicks a link from your RSS feed, they will are shown a short, fully branded, interstitial advertisement between the click of the link, and the final destination. You have control over the look, feel, and format of the page, as well as how often offers appear to your user.

Read more

• RSS Feeds Monetization: How To Profit From RSS Feeds
• RSS Monetization? The Game Has Changed; Same Rules May Not Apply
• RSS Feed Reader Graduates To Social News Aggregator: Adobe MyFeedz
• How To Create A RSS Feed From Any Web Page
• Submit Your RSS Feed To Google Now
• Bad RSS? Issues And Problems In Feeds Future
• SEO Optimization Via RSS Feeds: How To

Originally written by Livia Iacolare for Master New Media and first published as: "RSS Feeds Monetization Tools: A Mini-Guide"