Blog Readers Made Simple

Perhaps you’ve noticed the blog feed buttons in our sidebar, but were wondering what the heck they are!

Blog feed services allow you to track your favorite sites without having to actually visit the site every time you want to see if it’s been updated. You can get help with a variety of feed services through our Help With Feeds link,  but since I use Google Reader, I want to show you just how slick it is in hopes of making a convert out of you.  No more having to click on each and every link in your blogroll, bookmarks or favorites to see if a blog has been updated.  You simply login to Google Reader and see immediately which of the blogs you have subscribed to have been updated!  It makes life online so much easier, saving you oodles of time.  We want you to know how to use a blog reader so you can get the very latest news from Scrapbookgraphics by subscribing to Studio Matters!

First thing you will need to use Google Reader is a Google account.  Registration is free.  Once you’re signed up, make sure you’re logged in and then head to the Google Reader. Of course, there will be no subscriptions listed until you add some, but after you do, this is where you’ll land, the Home page with A Look at What’s New (most recent posts to blogs you’ve subscribed to), and Messages from the Google Reader Team.

Click on the Add Subscriptions link to quickly add a URL to your list of subscribed blogs.  I simply copy and paste newly found blogs’ URLs and click Add.  Continue until all of your favorite blogs are added.

After you’ve added your blogs, you can click on the Feed Settings menu to change the way your list is sorted, to rename subscriptions (I often change mine to the person’s name instead of their blog’s name) or to unsubscribe.  You can also create folders for different types of blogs/sites (Scrap Blogs, Political Sites, Stores, etc.).

 

To use the Google Reader, you simply click on one of the blog links in the lefthand pane, and a preview of the site appears like magic for you to see–the above image shows the Expanded View which allows you to see images straight from the blog.  If you want to go to the blog to see more details or leave a comment, you simply click on the arrow next to the title of the blog post in the righthand pane, and a new window/tab opens taking you to the actual site.

You have the option of viewing only the updated blogs (as the above image shows) or all of the blogs in your list of subscriptions (shown below).  Updated blogs are bold with the number of updates since you last read the blog through the reader in parentheses.

If you want to be able to see an overview of several posts from your favorite blog, you can switch to List View instead of Expanded View:

Makes it very easy to find an entry you would like to revisit.

If you  want to quickly scroll through the most recently updated blogs, you can switch to All Items view and you will see a preview of every recent post in the righthand pane:

As you scroll through the list, you will notice the Updated Subscriptions list will change…those you’ve read disappear from the list.  And at any moment, an update could appear, so you always have the latest news.

To manage your subscriptions, click the Manage Subscriptions link at the bottom of the lefthand pane.

You will arrive at this view of your subscriptions.  You can mass delete, add tags or add to folders, etc.by selecting the items (checking the box on the left) and performing the action.  This is a great way to see which items need to be renamed.

One of the tabs on this page is Goodies.

It shows you how to add some quick links to your bookmark bar in your browser for easier blurfing (blog + surfing…that’s what I like to call it!).  And it also shows you how to use Google Reader on your internet-enabled mobile phone!  I like the Subscribe as You Surf quick link.  This allows you to easily add new sites to your subscription list on the fly.

Now, keep in mind, this is not just for blogs.  If you find yourself going to certain sites over and over looking to see if they are updated, you can add them, too.

We hope that Studio Matters will be the first blog you add to your Google Reader.  Simply add http://www.scrapbookgraphics.com/blog/ to your subscriptions and you’ll be all set!