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RSS GraffitiI've been playing with several RSS Feeders to attempt to get The Stage Coach's Diggin's & Plunder Blog and Active Rain blog to automatically feed to Facebook.  But until this week, none of them accomplished it the way I had hoped.  On a fluke, I searched the applications for RSS one more time, and discovered RSS Graffiti.

For me, the selling point is, I can send RSS feed to my Personal Page and/or The Stage Coach's Fan Page on Facebook, and it shows up on the Wall and in my Fans'/Friends' Feeds!  Bingo!  Other applications created Tabs or Boxes, and did not provide the exposure I was looking for... And Manually feeding them out was a big time waster every time I put some thing up.  RSS graffiti is an easy set up, and comes with a multitude of options.

This week, I will be re-planning my current Blog-posting schematic to make sure that nothing is being repeated.  Plus, at this point, I am only feeding to The Stage Coach's Fan page, and not my personal page, until I can figure out a way to keep them from being published at the same time.  [Feature Request! Optional feed posting Delay!]

If you give it a try, come back and let me know what you think!  Or if you're using an application that works for you, please tell me about it!

***Comments updated with Developer Feed Back!***  See below

 

Michael Fontana - The Stage Coach - HOme Stager Austin Home Staging

 

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39 Comments on Feeding Active Rain Blog to your Facebook Page - Updated

DEC
20
2009
2 Featured Posts

Thanks for the information. Will give it a try. Wow keeping up with this seems like a full time job! Always appreciate helpful tips and advice that can be implemented to help our business work more efficiently.

10:56am • #1
412,393 Points 1 Featured Post

I'm always happy to get helpful tips/ideas on AR.  Thanks for sharing today.

Patricia

11:02am • #2
706,299 Points 6 Featured Posts Outside Blog Called Shot Master

Thanks for this tip...am bookmarking, and will get back to this.  

11:44am • #3
DEC
21
2009
724,147 Points 223 Featured Posts Localism Sponsor Outside Blog Attended Rain Camp Called Shot Master

OHgood. I've been killing myself trying to figure out how to send my blog postings to my company page and not my personal profile. I hope this works. 

1:03am • #4
1,215,833 Points 44 Featured Posts Localism Sponsor Outside Blog Attended Rain Camp Called Shot Master

Hi Michael - Nice solution you've found! Another alternative is to use the Notes application to import your blog, but you're limited to just one feed. I believe this works for both Profile and Fan pages.

1:24am • #5
1,194,245 Points 89 Featured Posts Localism Sponsor Outside Blog Called Shot Master

I am on my way to having two fan pages now.  One for each of my AR outside blogs.  Thanks

I never had a fan page because I did not want to have to keep it up.  This should work,

4:02am • #6
126,176 Points

Thanks for this post. You did a bunch of research and work and now we can all benefit.

Have a great day

Tony

6:04am • #7
115,562 Points

Hello Michael!  I really appreciate the 'nugget' this morning!!  All the best!

6:55am • #8
361,217 Points 11 Featured Posts Outside Blog Called Shot Master

Thank you! I am going to try it right now. I also found it so time consuming to put AR stuff just on the fan page so I am hoping this is as easy as you say.  I'll let you know.

7:26am • #9
376,903 Points 85 Featured Posts Localism Sponsor Outside Blog Hit Router Attended Rain Camp Called Shot Master

Great tip!  Thank you so much for sharing.  Time to bookmark this one!

7:27am • #10
278,556 Points 15 Featured Posts

I do feed Facebook from here but I will give this a go.

7:41am • #11
848,842 Points 153 Featured Posts Localism Sponsor Outside Blog Hit Router Attended Rain Camp Called Shot Master

woot!

Thank you so much, I have been wanting a way to feed by Fan Page. I hope you can be selective as not all my posts are local some are just techy and not interested in feeding my fan page those.

So I will give it a shot.

7:48am • #12
123,902 Points 1 Featured Post

Thanks for stopping by, Everyone!  I hope you find this tool as easy to set up and implement as I did!

Yesterday, I submitted a Feature Request for a Delay option - hoping to send my feeds up to The Stage Coach page, then, like 8 hours later, my Personal Page so it does not seem as repetitive.  I also asked if there is a way to automatically select specific image files within the blog feed.  I use so many images, the one next to the wall post needs to make sense in order to appear professional.  They've responded to my first request already and will be implementing a Delay feature going forward.

@John N: I found the Notes import severely limiting.  That's why I've been playing with all kinds of tools. Most importantly, for me, professionally, it's all about the visual.  So I have to have images included.

Missy: Not sure if there is a filter option. Though, as I mentioned above, the publishers seem very responsive.  I'd bet they could implement a Filter based on Tags.

Merry Christmas, Y'all!
The Stage Coach - Austin's Home Staging HandyMan!

8:37am • #13

Nice. One of my hesitations about social networking is having to post the same thing to different sites. Thanks for the tip.

9:47am • #14
1 Featured Post Outside Blog

Michael,

This works great and it is so easy to set up! Wow, thanks for such a great tip.

9:48am • #15
118,333 Points 2 Featured Posts Outside Blog

Thanks for the tip!  I will check into it right now...  So much technology and so little time!  lol

11:03am • #16
147,307 Points 5 Featured Posts Localism Sponsor Attended Rain Camp Called Shot Master

Thank you. It was easy to set up and works perfectly.

 

11:39am • #17
361,217 Points 11 Featured Posts Outside Blog Called Shot Master

I just did it, posted a new blog, and there it was on my fan page.  Awesome!  Thank you!!!!!

12:03pm • #18
289,090 Points 66 Featured Posts Outside Blog

There's 4 ways to add content to your FB Page.  RSS is probably my least favorite for a couple of reasons.  From a past post http://areweconnected.com/2009/07/adding-content-to-your-fan-page/

The RSS: You can have the content auto post via an RSS feed.  This is how most people will do it.  It’s automatic and they just set it and forget about it. Your viewers will have the ability to “comment” and “like” this from their stream.  Links go direct to your post and are DO Follow.  The text chosen will be the first section of words from your post.  Do your posts all have wonderful attention grabbing content in the 1st paragraph?  They better if you plan on using this method.  While the feed you grab may include pictures they won’t show up on the wall here, just text.

I'll also add that you can't change the Anchor Text as well - but hey, that's just my opinion...

: )

 

12:04pm • #19
123,902 Points 1 Featured Post

Glad to see so many of you are liking this as well...

@Mike:  Adding content via RSS appeals to me solely for the Automation perspective.  The RSS Graffiti application covers about 95% of what I have been looking for.  I tried Notes, and did not like it. I tried several other RSS applications, and none of them worked reliably, automatically, or graphically.  By Graphically, I just mean that I need to have images in the posts, and like you mention above, most RSS feeders do not include them.  RSS Grafitti, on the other hand, does include an image!  I just need to work out how the application will pick the correct (the one I want) picture automatically.

Some users have complained about missing images, from what I read, and in most cases, it was the RSS feed not including them which is an easy fix...

The Stage Coach - Austin's Home Staging HandyMan!

12:26pm • #20
2 Featured Posts Outside Blog

Thanks for the great tip.  I joined a new brokerage, so I plan to make a fan page for us on Facebook.  I'd love to be able to link my AR content on there.  Thanks again!

12:44pm • #21
344,045 Points 10 Featured Posts Localism Sponsor Outside Blog Attended Rain Camp Called Shot Master

Hey Michael -- This is really cool. I have not done too much on FB yet.  Just a little socializing.  I am bookmarking this so I can apply your tip. Thanks!

3:22pm • #22
Localism Sponsor

Trying it out, dont know if I am setting it up correctly.  We will see, thanks for the info.

3:41pm • #23
Localism Sponsor

Woohoo its working, this is so cool!  Doesnt look like it does old post, just new ones right?

3:59pm • #24
123,902 Points 1 Featured Post

@Trisha: Correct - only new ones.  Don't think you'd want it to pick up all of the old ones - might scare your friends and fans away!

Michael

4:09pm • #25
937,507 Points 361 Featured Posts Outside Blog Attended Rain Camp Called Shot Master

Very cool Michael. I have been looking for a way to do this for my company's fan page and also for the ShortSaleSuperStars fan page.,  OK I'm off to play with this. Thanks.

4:28pm • #26
239,072 Points 1 Featured Post

This RSS Graffiti sounds like a great time saver for busy bloggers like us.

7:20pm • #27
DEC
22
2009

Great information.  Thanks - bookmarked for the new year!

2:05pm • #29
429,860 Points 5 Featured Posts Called Shot Master

Hi Michael,  This is one of the reasons we love Active Rain, there is so much information we benefit from.  Thanks for the post and Merry Christmas.

4:51pm • #30
DEC
28
2009

Thanks for the great info.  I will check it out and see if I can feed it to my FB fan page too!

6:36pm • #31
DEC
29
2009
123,902 Points 1 Featured Post

I'm glad many of you are enjoying this FB App - I just posted a new blog regarding FB's Notes Application, and how it has begun allowing images.  Check it out here:

The Stage Coach - Austin's Home Staging HandyMan!

9:24am • #32
DEC
30
2009
260,424 Points 10 Featured Posts Localism Sponsor Outside Blog Attended Rain Camp Called Shot Master

I am so glad I found your post today. I was trying to figure out how to get my blog posts to go not only to my FB page, but to the 3 pages I have set up as Business Pages. RSS Graffiti works seamlessly!

12:46pm • #33
DEC
31
2009
123,902 Points 1 Featured Post

A couple of quick updates:

I'm pasting a copy of a response I received for a question I had posted on GetSatisfaction for the developers of RSS Graffiti.  The Question was in regards to image selection and trying to find a way to make sure RSS Graffiti posted my desired image alongside the link.  Many of my posts have several pictures and there's four in my digital signature alone.  Normally, I want the primary picture of the home to show, or one of the images that relates to the topic.  Not any of the signatures.  Here's the Technical Response:

"RSSGraffiti looks for media in the following order.

First it searches for videos, then for audio and then for images. In your case we are only interested as you said in images.

It looks for such media first in enclosures and If any image enclosures exist, the first one gets published without further checks.

If no enclosures were found, then the text part of the message is being parsed and for every img tag found the application tries to validate it against specific rules. This is done in order to exclude images like image buttons or injected advertisement banners from being published.

The first image that passes these checks gets published. If no image is found even in the text of the item then no image is published.

So in short if you want to control which image gets published the safest way is to put it in an enclosure, or alternatively make sure it appears on the text before any other image.

Your idea of custom naming convention is not in the features of RSSGraffiti today, but it is something that we could possibly implement in the future. But since we have other things that we evaluate of higher priority for now I'd suggest to use one of the approaches I mentioned a few lines above in order to have the desired result.

If you need more help or clarifications please do not hesitate to ask again. Thanks for trying RSSGraffiti and for your valuable feedback.  Dimitris"

Having done some Google searches, I am unable to figure out how to make sure my Wordpress Blog images are put in Enclosures.  And a search of Active Rain came up fruitless as well.  So, in the weeks ahead, as time allows, I will try to find more information about this.  And I will also reply to the comment on GetSatisfaction and see if Dimitris can point me in the right direction.

Next up: I posted a blog earlier this week about Facebook Notes now including Thumbnail image files.  Well, one of the Developers of RSS Graffiti came by and posted some great information on what makes their product superior.   And I agree with him - it is superior - and it seems like most commenters here would agree.  But I needed to try it out for myself.  You can read more about this here.

Most importantly, here's an important point from the Developer as to the benefits of RSS Graffiti that was commented on The Stage Coach's Facebook Page:

"...RSS Graffiti and Notes are much much different. RSS Graffiti writes on your wall (hence the name) and points to your original story. Notes on the other hand, imports (copies) your story form your blog into the Notes application and then publishes on your wall a story about your new Note. Focus on that fundamental difference and you will then start noticing a number of differences in details. This will give you a more clear picture why we started RSS Graffiti when we already had Notes available in Facebook. Best regards, Yannis for RSS Graffiti"

I have to admit I am a bit surprised/impressed that the RSS Graffiiti guys are in tune to what's being said about their Application.  It's one thing to sign up for a Google Alert - it's a whole different thing to step up and become part of the conversation.  I am looking forward to future updates from them...

The Stage Coach - Austin's Home Staging HandyMan!

9:17am • #34
JAN
07
2010

Thanks Michael.  I'll try it out and let you know.

Alice Wilson

 

12:01pm • #35

Hi Michael,

I just set it up.  Is there a lag time between when I set up RSS Graffitti and when my blog appears in FB?  Maybe I'm just being impatient.

Thanks for your time.

 

-Alice Wilson

12:29pm • #36
123,902 Points 1 Featured Post

hi, Alice:
Luckily, I'm having lunch, so I am able to answer you timely!

Some times there is a delay. Some times, it's longer than others based on FB activity... or network traffic etc.

Yesterday, my A/R blog took about an hour to show up.  I say "about" because after 10-15 minutes it was not up, and I came back an hour later and it was posted.  So it could have been 20 minutes.

Did you hit preview when setting it up?
The Stage Coach - Austin's Home Staging HandyMan!

12:37pm • #37
JAN
11
2010
405,763 Points 2 Featured Posts Outside Blog

Will it send all Members Only posts or any post you write. There may posts you don't want ANYONE to see.

1:13pm • #38
123,902 Points 1 Featured Post

hi, Robert:
Not sure, to be frank. It posts the RSS feed you give it. I did not see a RSS Feed Icon on either my A/R Outside Blog, or my Localism page.  There may be a way to get the feed from one od these, but I do not have the answer.

If you don't want ANYONE to see a post - why would you post it at all?  I have seen several accounts of "Members Only" Posts showing up in Google searches.  So don't think for a minute that private posts are safe from public view.

My rule of thumb, don't post any thing that your mom would be ashamed to hear you say.

thanks for stopping!

The Stage Coach - Austin's Home Staging HandyMan!

1:27pm • #39
MAR
24
2010

Hi..

I've tried the notes and inport a 'Blog/RSS'. Does work but I have several Albums I would like to share with Facebook. Like allot of user I found RSS Graffiti. Downloaded and configured permissions and can view one of my Albums. Now someone who has allot of experience working with Facebook may know how to the next step. But, I'm new to this 'Social networking' and have had problems trying to find what I have to do next to get this to work. Any help or guidelines will help..

 

Thanks in advance..

Joe
2:31pm • #40

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Michael Fontana @ The Stage Coach

Round Rock, TX

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Round Rock Home Stager Austin Home Staging

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