So, you’re at our JM blog absolutely LOVING all the crucial information, awesome new designs and personal behind-the-scenes experience you are having!

So you say to yourself, “Self, I just could not live week-to-week without a fairly regular update of JM’s insights and news.” And you go to “subscribe.”

This is often where people become confused and thoughts are flying – “What is a web-based news reader?,” “RSS?,” “Feed my blog? What kind of food does it eat?”

There are so many different ways to subscribe to a blog but I will focus more on some of the easier ways to stay connected with topics, businesses and people of your interest.

My best advice to you is look for an orange square – this signifies an RSS feed. RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication which allows you to read the blog in any RSS supporting interface. For details on RSS check out this site – https://weblogs.about.com/od/rssfeedsandsubscriptions/p/RSSFeeds.htm.

Once you’ve clicked on the RSS icon, you will have a couple of options and I will touch on three different and easy ways to subscribe through RSS. One option is to put the blog in your live bookmarks up in your toolbar. This makes the blog accessible in your web browser and always at your disposal to view the most recent updates.

Google Reader is a website that collects blog feeds and is a fairly simple way to organize your subscriptions if you are following several blogs. On Google Reader you can search topics and subscribe through an easy input of the blog URL at the top of the page.

My favorite option is Feedly.  Feedly offers an aesthetically pleasing layout with an extremely simple organization scheme, almost mirroring a magazine site. After clicking the RSS icon, you can chose Feedly as your interface by selecting the green Feedly icon.

If you cannot find an RSS feed, then look for a “subscribe” button, where you can choose My Yahoo or install a feed onto your Google homepage. There are a number of other readers on there and I would encourage you to explore them on your own.

If all else fails, most blogs have a “subscribe by e-mail” section. However, if you decided to become an extreme and faithful blogger your inbox might become inundated with new blog posts.

Though the blogosphere may seem complex and frightening, I would encourage you to check it out. You can’t really make too many mistakes by trying to subscribe to blogs and researching news readers. Comment and ask questions and we’ll be sure to get you up and blogging!