Using Feedly to Read a Substack Publication Without Email

Feedly is a program to read, organize, and save communications from online content providers you subscribe to.

The first I’d ever heard about Feedly was from Linda Stufflebean. She subscribes to “a LOT of genealogy blogs” (see Additional Reading/Viewing), and her inbox was flooded with emails. To avoid that, she uses Feedly. She says “it’s an aggregator—like an electronic file cabinet.” Instead of an email, when a new post goes live, Feedly adds the URL to a list for her to visit when convenient. Kind of like my inbox at Substack, but you can add feeds from more platforms.

Add Publications

So I signed up for Feedly’s News Reader, which is free. To add something to my feed, I clicked on Follow Sources and added

https://YourFamilyQuest.substack.com/feed 

to the search box. Hit enter. The Substack page popped up, and I clicked Follow.

Common Mistake

Then I tried adding my website to Feedly. This time, I got a message that I need to “Build RSS Feed.”

Feedly uses RSS (Really Simple Syndication). My website doesn’t have RSS. It doesn’t send out emails, so it can’t be followed on Feedly unless you sign up for the Pro+ subscription. But why would you want to create an RSS feed for my website? I don’t publish anything there, and the only notifications Feedly might post is when I make changes to my site.

All Substack Publications Have RSS

Remember Karen Foyster featured in my tip, “Substack Has Reserved a Publication Address For You?” I added her to my Feedly even though she has not published any articles on Substack. All I had to do was type:

• https://thenameofthepublication.substack.com/feed.

All Substack publications have RSS, but the secret is that you must use “/feed” at the end so Feedly can make the connection.

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Additional Reading/Viewing:

Barbara@ProjectKin, Connecting Writers in Substack to Feedly! There’s a Simple Solution.

Feedly Documentation, How to find Substack RSS feeds?

Justin Pot, How to Find the RSS Feed URL for Almost Any Site

Substack Help Center, Is there an RSS Feed for My Publication?

Feedly Documentation, List of How To add various online content

Cleo Murphy, The Power of the RSS Feed and The Old New Internet

Linda Stufflebean, My Favorite Genealogy Blogs

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Call for Contributors

Why should we all have to learn the hard way? Please share what you’ve learned. Email me at YourFamilyQuest@gmail.com

Upcoming Events:

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Thursday, 25 September at 10 am/1 pm (PT/ET) Projectkin Live: A Conversation with Karen de Bruyne

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