First, you really should allow comments if at all possible. I understand there are a few people that just can't do it – they have limited internet access, perhaps, or someone else is posting their letters online. It's probably better to have a blog without comments than no blog at all.
That being said, it's really pretty much common etiquette these days to allow commenting on your blog at least (and hopefully trackback too).
Comments are part of a conversation between you and those people who are interested in what you're writing about. I really think you need to have a way to respond to those people. There are three online ways this might be done:
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I've been noticing a trend – almost all blogs now have commenting, but on a lot of blogs there's no response at all. So if someone comments they're left wondering – did the person ever read it? Do they care that I wrote it? What do they think about it? You know, kind of the same things you wonder when you post and no one comments!
No, I don't think you MUST respond to EVERY comment. If you're getting many comments on every post, just an occasional interjection into the conversation is probably enough. But let people know you're there listening and interested in what they have to say too.
This is especially true if someone new leaves a comment. I realize that your Mom comments all the time, and you talk to her on the phone. But there's this new girl that just happened on your site and got interested – let her know you appreciate her input, or her prayers, or her ideas.
Who's been doing a good job on this lately? May I suggest Sandy's Neipu Notebook, Missionary Mom, Peregrine Sojo – Kitty's Kronicle, and les Davey de France.
Why not look over the last few weeks of posts, and see if there's someone you can respond to?
What do you think – am I waaaay off? Partly right? How do you communicate with your visitors? Leave a comment (I might even respond)!
{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
When I did have comments open I didn’t get very many, possibly because most of my readers are subscribed by e-mail. However, I had a big problem with SPAM. I could work harder and figure out how to get rid of that somehow and open comments again. Thanks for the tips!
I reckon that you are absolutely correct about this. In fact I wrote a response to it and tried to trackback to you, but the trackback didn’t work.
You can access it at http://www.journalhome.com/billh…utchison/41139/
For dealing with spam it depends a lot on what blogging engine you are using. With WordPress there are many plugins available for use. I use Akismet, which filters out most spam, and I have yet to find a false positive.
With most free hosted solutions like blogger or journalhome you can enable something like captcha, which will display an image that people need to enter into the comment to submit it. That is very helpful in eliminating most spam.
I hope that helps.
Bill,
Thanks for info on spam.
Glad to help
It should also be noted that if you comment on a blog it is good to follow the conversation and continue to participate, and not just drop and run.
Responding to comments is the hardest part of blogging for me.
But, in my own personal blogging habits, I hardly ever return to a blog to see if the blogger responded to me or not. I don’t return because (a) I don’t remember where I commented or (b) don’t have the time to go and just see if they happened to respond or not.
So, because this is what I do, I assume people don’t come back looking for answers.
When I have time I email back a response to comments–this however is not an option for Blogger bloggers since there is no place for commenters to leave “email” addresses.
If a question is asked that is of greater interest than to that one person, I will (if I have time) email and post a follow-up comment on the post.
I LOVE the “notify me of followup comments via email” option. Like you have here. I think that is SO helpful! I wish more blogging platforms had that option.
Here is a question I have . . . Is it worth it to have a posted “comment policy?” What is your take on that?
Glad to see there’s some conversation on this one. I guess I should write about spam sometime!
I think, Amanda, that the trend is to watch for responses to your comments. It’s getting easier and easier to do, with services such as Haloscan (what I use here), WordPress (where you can often subscribe to a “comment feed”), and cocomment (an extra service that I use that keeps track of all your comments and the responses in one place).
As these services get easier, more and more people will notice if you reply or not.
I also follow up with comments that I have made a fairly simple way. I just create a folder in my bookmarks labeled “commented articles” and then I visit those for the next week or so after I have dropped a comment. If there is follow up conversation I leave it there, but if there is no more conversation I usually delete it from my bookmarks after a week.
That works for me, but it might not be for everyone.
Remember, as you are looking at the comments and responses, that you won’t won’t know which comments have been answered by email. For example, I usually try to at least write a quick response to comments but I don’t always post it.
i find comments helpful. I don’t answer every comment at all, but I do some. Many times I go to the commentors own blog and respond to one of their postings. I enjoy finding out about other people’s blogs – but to respond to every comment – I would cease doing my job and just comment