One of my most effective productivity hacks, aside from using Daily Action Maps, has been the use of RSS Feeds to stay up-to-date with all of my favorite websites. At first, I managed my feeds via netvibes, which is still a great option if you only subscribed to a small handful of sites, however, my list is closing in around three figures now, so I needed to upgrade my feed reader.

This post is for those new to RSS, those who have not fully witnessed the glory of RSS and those who are a little frustrated with RSS. I’ve broken it down into three steps (each with a little video demonstration):

Step One: What is RSS?
Step Two: Great, but which Feed Manager Should I Use?
Step Three: Information Overload! How do I Handle All of these Feeds?

What is RSS?

RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication, but off the bat does not seem all that simple. Rather than writing paragraphs on the technical wizardry behind this fantastic little gizmo, here is a great video tutorial explaining what RSS is and how you can use it:

Great, but which Feed Manager Should I Use?

There is an extensive array of RSS feed managers to choose from and frankly, I would rather not list them all. If you want an overview of all the available feed managers out there, read Mashable’s Productivity God article. Personally, I think the answer is indisputable: Google Reader. Here are just a few reasons why it kicks so much ass:

• Integrates with your Gmail account
• Allows you to star and share items
• Very easy keyboard shortcuts
• Google Gears allows you to download ALL of your feeds!

Again, I have included a little video tutorial to help get you up and running on Google Reader:

To make life even easier, here are some great keyboard shortcuts for Google Reader courtesy of Mashable:

j/k - selects the next/previous item in the list
space/shift-space - moves the page down/up
n/p - in list view, selects the next item without opening it
o - in list view, expands or collapses the selected item
enter - in list view, expands or collapses the selected item
s - stars the selected item
shift-s - shares the selected item
m - switches the read state of the selected item
t - opens the tagging field for the selected item
v - opens the original source for this article in a new window
shift-a - marks all items in the current view as read
1 - displays the subscription as expanded items
2 - displays the subscription as a list of headlines
r - refreshes the unread counts in the navigation
shift-n/p - selects the next/previous subscription or folder in the navigation
shift-x - expand or collapse a folder selected in the navigation
shift-o - opens the item currently selected in the navigation
gh - goes to the Google Reader homepage
ga - goes to the “All items” view
gs - goes to the “Starred items” view
gt - allows you to navigate to a tag by entering the tag name
gu - allows you to navigate to a subscription by entering the subscription name
u - hides and shows the list of subscriptions
? - displays a quick guide to all of Reader’s shortcuts

Information Overload! How do I Handle All of these Feeds?

Subscribing to RSS feeds quickly becomes addictive. I started with around 20 and found myself over reading over 80 different websites within only a few weeks. Although RSS makes information management ridiculously easy, it can put a huge damper on your productivity if you spend all day reading your latest feeds. Here is a video interview conducted by Tim Ferriss with Robert Scoble on how Scoble manages to read 622 RSS feeds each morning:

To add my own little productivity tip on managing RSS feeds, only allow yourself to read them during your 30-60 minute lunch break and DO NOT open Google Reader for the rest of the day. This is very much like only checking your email twice a day, but if you have enough will power, you’ll find that you can still get all of the important news read (even when you have over 100+ feeds).

Well, now you know How to Master RSS in Three Easy Steps! Just remember, reading your Feeds can get very addictive. You have been warned.