Research showed that merely 2% of US employees subscribe to RSS feeds, and only 9% know what such feeds are. These numbers might be a bit disappointing, but please realize the fact that RSS is a simple and transparent technology that you — as an end-user — don’t have to know that to take advantage of it.

Internet marketers are certainly eager to use it for different applications such as podcasting, syndication of blog and site content, and also as an end run around spam filters.

According to BtoB magazine, 8% of US email marketers used RSS as of June 2006. The low actual usage by email marketers belies more widespread interest in the technology.

A separate study found that nearly a third (32%) of US marketers were either interested of very interested in advertising via RSS though.

Perhaps the RSS community could learn something from podcasting. Podcasting uses exactly the same RSS technology — with enclosures. It leaped beyond what marketers expected when iTunes 4.9 was released with podcast integration.

Now anyone who uses the software don’t have to know what the technology is, they could just use the software to subscribe and download to podcast shows they are interested in.

The integration of podcatching software into iTunes is key.

In future version of Microsoft Windows and Apple Mac OS operating systems, we could expect better integration with RSS.

As a marketer, I can’t wait the time to see that happens before our very eyes.

[eMarketer]