Create an Autoblogging Site

Wouldn’t it be nice if you didn’t have to write all of the articles on your blog? For instance, you may have a blog about gardening. Wouldn’t it be nice to have an RSS feed of video tutorials from YouTube or maybe some garden recipes from your favorite food blogger? It only takes a few steps to create an autoblogging site, and it’s all thanks to some fancy tools, RSS feeds, and a little research of your own.

In this post, we’ll show you everything you need to do to create an autoblogging site that automatically imports content from one or more RSS feeds as actual blog posts. Keep reading for your step-by-step guide…

The essential elements of an autoblogging site on WordPress

Autoblogging sites were at one point under attack from Google and other search engines.

The reason for this was because some websites would simply pull content from other sources, making for lots of duplicate articles around the internet.

However, there are still successful ways to add value with an autoblogging site. You just have to embrace a few elements:

  • Avoid making a site that only aggregates content from elsewhere. Add value to your site by creating your own content in conjunction with the autoblogging.
  • Aggregate a wide range of media types. This includes videos, articles, podcasts, and infographics.
  • Stick to the latest news if you plan on sharing seasonal or topical information.
  • Focus primarily on evergreen content that’ll still be relevant in a few years.
  • Don’t only rely on your autoblog. Keep adding value such as job boards, product recommendations, and eBooks.
  • Consider making an exclusive community for people in your niche to chat through a forum and analyze the articles from your blog.

How to create an autoblogging site on WordPress

Now that you know the basic approach, here’s how to create your own autoblog website…

Step 1: Choose a platform

An autoblogging website is nothing without a solid content management system. There are plenty of blogging systems out there, but the one we recommend above them all is WordPress.

WordPress makes it easy to create an autoblogging site

WordPress not only allows you to create an autoblogging site, but it has plugins and settings for everything from eCommerce to complex forms.

A self-hosted WordPress site is the way to go for a number of reasons:

  • You don’t have to be an advanced developer to make a beautiful, functional website.
  • It’s the most popular blogging platform, so you’ll have plenty of resources online and integrations to help you build your site.
  • You don’t actually have to pay for WordPress itself. The software is entirely free. Keep in mind that you will have to pay for some other elements like hosting and premium themes.
  • WordPress is insanely flexible, with plugins for adding any type of feature, including autoblogging.
  • Most reputable hosting companies have one-click WordPress installation buttons.
  • WordPress integrates with many page builders for visual, drag-and-drop editing.

Step 2: Find a hosting plan and select a domain name

In order to power your WordPress autoblogging site, you need WordPress hosting. And in order to make it possible for people to access your site on that hosting, you need a domain name.

Pick the right host – we recommend Bluehost

A host is a company that houses and maintains the servers used for hosting and serving up website files.

The budget hosts are nice for smaller startups and blogs, while the managed WordPress hosting is there for rapidly scaling, higher traffic sites.

Since you’re just getting started with your autoblogging site, you don’t need high-powered hosting quite yet (you can always upgrade once you start growing).

For good budget hosting that’s easy to work with, we recommend Bluehost because:

  • It’s affordable.
  • You get a free domain name.
  • The dashboard makes it easy to install WordPress and manage your site.

Bluehost's WordPress shared hosting.

Pick the perfect domain name

When you sign up for Bluehost, Bluehost will give you a free domain name for your first year, so you won’t need to pay any extra.

Here’s what you should know about selecting a domain for your autoblogging site:

Here are some tips for choosing a domain name.

Step 3: Select a WordPress theme that caters to autoblogging

Your WordPress theme controls how your site looks, so it’s an important decision.

You can find free and premium themes, some of which are made specifically for autoblogging.

Neve is the perfect autoblogging site theme for WordPress

The free Neve WordPress theme is a great flexible option to act as the base for your autoblogging site. Or, you can also find lots of other free themes at WordPress.org.

Most themes aren’t labeled as “autoblogging capable,” so here are some suggestions for finding the right theme:

  • Find a theme that focuses on content, like for magazines, publications, or video galleries.
  • Check out the features from each theme to ensure they have what you need.
  • Ensure that you can customize the heck out of your theme.
  • Locate a theme that reflects the style, color, and format of your brand.

Step 4: Install the Feedzy RSS Feeds plugin

There are quite a few RSS feed plugins for WordPress, but none of them have the capabilities for autoblogging like Feedzy RSS Feeds. The Lite version is a great place to start for testing and figuring out what you want from the plugin, but you’ll need the premium version to create a true autoblogging site where you import external content as its own blog post.

Beyond being able to import RSS feed items as actual posts, the premium version of Feedzy RSS Feeds also offers:

To get started, install the free core Feedzy plugin from WordPress.org.

Next, sign up for the Feedzy Pro plugin and download it from your user dashboard. Upload the plugin to your website and activate it as well. Keep in mind that in order for the Pro plugin to work you must have both of these plugins installed.

Install both Feedzy plugins

Note: You will also be prompted to copy and paste the license key from your Themeisle dashboard to your WordPress dashboard. This is to activate the Pro features.

Step 5: Configure feed to post functionality

Now, you’re ready to start importing RSS feeds as posts on your WordPress site.

To start, you’ll need to find the RSS feed of the content that you want to import. This could be videos, social media posts, products, other blog posts, etc. Most of the time, you can find a dedicated RSS feed for the content that you want to import. If you can’t, you might be able to find a workaround. For example, FetchRSS lets you convert an Instagram profile to an RSS feed.

Once you have the RSS feed URL for the content that you want to import, open your WordPress dashboard and go to Feedzy RSS > Import Posts:

import posts

Next, click on the New Import button:

new import

Then, paste the URL of your feed into the field and click the Next button.

Enter your RSS feed to create an autoblogging feed

If you want to only include (or exclude) content with specific keywords in it, you can add those filters in the next step:

filters

You can also choose how you would like the original post elements to show up on your own blog. For instance, you might put all posts in one category or add a featured image.

feed assign

Once you’ve made your choices, click the Save & Activate button.

run now

Then, choose the Run Now button to start importing content.

Example of autoblogging import on WordPress site

You can now go to your Posts page and see all of the imported content! Congrats!

If you want a more detailed tutorial on this feature, check out our guide on how to import RSS feeds as WordPress posts 👈

And if you want to rewrite the content to make it unique, you can take advantage of Feedzy’s WordAI integration:

wordai

Create an autoblogging site today

With WordPress and the Feedzy RSS Feeds plugin, it’s easy to create an autoblogging site for any type of content.

All you need is a working RSS feed. Then, you can use Feedzy to import the content from that feed as actual blog posts on WordPress. You can even set up filters to make sure you only include the right content.

Of course, there’s also a lot more to creating a successful autoblogging site than just nailing the basic functionality. So once you have your autoblog up and running, you’ll want to learn about some other must-have WordPress plugins and some strategies that you can use to increase traffic to your site.

Do you have any other questions about how to create an autoblog with WordPress? Leave a comment and we’ll try to help!

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