Faking a Feed Count - The Real Reason To Do It

Last week I posted about getting more feed subscribers, and one thing I mentioned was to fake your Feedburner feed count. That was to employ the power of social proof and convince your visitors to sign-up based on “Oh wow, if a bunch of other people subscribe to this, I should do it, too.”

That should get you past the 0 subscriber mark at some point. (Maybe not to infinity though…)

But there’s a reason for every blog to make use of a fake feed count, no matter how many subscribers you actually have!

And the reason is: publicity!

I guess this applies mostly to internet marketing or business blogs where your visitors actually know what the Feedburner chicklet is, but if you’re reading this, chances are you have a blog that fits the description. So here are a few good tricks to try…

Use the feed count from a popular blog

It doesn’t really matter what the subscriber count is, just so it matches someone else’s exactly. And the blog has to be popular and have loyal readers.

What you want is for one of their loyal readers to visit your blog and think “OMG! That’s like totally some other celeb blogger’s feed chicklet!”

They’ll get all worked up and start commenting on your blog and spreading the word that you’re “busted” … like you were trying to keep things secret!

Change your feed count daily

Switch the feed count source on a daily basis. Try to fluctuate between 500, 100k, 3000, 1500, and 20, on a rotating basis.

That will definitely catch some attention (i.e. it’s great linkbait.) I’ve never seen anyone try this, so chances are, other bloggers will write about even if they know the “trick.”

Spread the word

Once you have your fake feed count ready, log-in to a spare hotmail account and email the other blogger, pretending to be a naive reader. Say something like “Hey Fred, I saw a feed count over at Joe Schmo’s blog and it looks like yours. What a coincidence!”

That blogger will probably fall for the trap and then come to your blog at least to see what the fuss is about. Then they’ll probably even leave a comment or write about it on their popular blog!

Then change your chicklet and repeat the process!

This should create a little buzz around your blog’s name. At the very least, your blog looks more popular due to increased comments!

? Subscriber Count

Another trick with your Feedburner chicklet is to Photoshop it. Then you can put something like a question mark or an infinity symbol in there to make people laugh.

Disclaimer

This might not work for your blog. If your blog has a serious, uptight, or professional tone in a credible industry, use caution.

It works perfect here because this blog is all about sleazy internet marketing tactics and making fun of people. Anyone not expecting people to fake earnings screenshots, testimonials, PR, Alexa rank, and/or feed count is way too naive to the whole internet marketing field!

If people want to expose my deceptive tactics, all they have to do is take one look at my home page.

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