How to use folders in Google Reader

This is a guest post by Laura Backes.

If you’re anything like me, then once you got started reading blogs they just sucked you in. It’s like a minor addiction and is near inevitable, waking up every morning, grabbing that first cup of coffee, and then settling in to check Google Reader (which is a lifesaver in itself as far as managing subscriptions goes!) to see who’s updated what, what’s happening where, and any other tidbits of information you can glean from your daily reads.

The problem with the blogging community is that it’s enormous and there are people blogging on every topic imaginable. What, that doesn’t sound like a problem? It’s really not until you start trying to keep up with hundreds of different blogs on all sorts of topics. So what’s a dedicated reader to do? There are only so many hours in the day, after all, and you can’t spend all your free time reading!

Thank goodness for the ability to organize everything into folders on Google Reader! I’m a little sheepish admitting that I didn’t even know the option to have folders existed until recently, so a huge chunk of my time was spent contemplating the best way to tackle an overwhelmingly high number of blog posts to read through.

Setting them up is fairly simple, once you figure out where everything is.

1. Log into Google Reader.
2. Click on a blog that you’re ready to sort into a folder.
3. At the top of the page in the center there is a button labeled “Feed Settings”.
4. Click on that a drop down list will appear and you can sort the blog accordingly – one of the options is “New Folder” where you can create the appropriate folder.
5. After the folder is created you can move blogs down into it simply by clicking on them and dragging them down.

Since the folders aren’t preset, you have the ability to organize your subscriptions in whatever way makes sense to you. It may be labeling some “must reads” and some “not as important”, or sorting them out by different topics such as “technology blogs” and “home improvement blogs”.

As soon as you’re organized you can go through and move your blog subscriptions around as you deem necessary. Having a sense of organization will make opening up Google Reader each morning or night not quite as tremendous of a task as before.

Utilizing the folders in Google Reader is one of those blog tools I wish I had known about a lot sooner. It’s a game changer – simple yet effective.

About the author
Laura Backes enjoys writing about all kinds of subjects and also topics related to internet providers in my area. You can reach her at laurabackes8@gmail.com.