This is a public service announcement to the blogging community.
Bloggers: Quality control your responses to comments! Your loyal readers are commenting and inputting their email addresses for a reason. They absolutely should be getting your responses returned to them via email!
I see so many bloggers who respond to comments (literally pages and pages of comments) and I swear I am not getting those responses back in my email. I’d say of all the bloggers I follow, that maybe 10% respond back to me via email. No commenting reader has time to go back to a blog post that they commented on, so that they can see your response.
I see all these comments. I know that bloggers are spending a lot of time to respond. Yet, I know for a fact that those responses are not getting seen. This happens so often that I honestly don’t have time to personally email 90% of the bloggers I follow to tell them, you need a maintenance check! My web designer triple-checked this for me, but in addition, I did it myself to ensure that this was the case.
You can too! Here’s how to do it.
- To ensure I was mimicking this process as a reader, I logged out of WordPress.
- Go to an old post. I randomly picked a post I wrote on 12/30/07.
- I put in my name, my work email address (versus my personal email address that’s attached to my WordPress account), and commented, “testing my own comments.”
- Then I logged back into WordPress and responded, “thanks for commenting.”
- I immediately received an email to my work address confirming that the process works.
Bloggers, can you please do this? PLEASE! Don’t rely on settings or confirmation from your web designer. Please please QA/QC your work!
Bonus, for any bloggers who still use Captcha, please turn it off. I’m considering instituting a policy of not commenting on blogs with Captcha, as I simply don’t have the time to play mind games!
When I set up my blog I had no idea how important it was to have a comment reply notification system. Fortunately I had one, though. I just don’t have time to go back to blogs to see if the author has responded to my comment. It is a shame that the time they spend is wasted. Great advice!
thanks dana. i agree, i do feel pretty bad that there are so many bloggers who are responding to comments, and those responses aren’t getting read. hopefully that will change if they read this post!
I comment to everyone who leaves me a comment. Do you know if you get my comments, because I am curious. I know there have been issues on Blogger with this, but never thought I had an issue on WordPress. Also, I use Intense Debate, so thought this also helped in people receiving my comments back from my own blog. Thanks for sharing this though and now ver curious.
Uh oh, Janine! Do I have this set up? I think I want to do that! I love getting email responses personally..
Hey Tamara, I don’t get any from you…FYI.
gold stars for you, janine and joi! tamara, sorry, no comment responses from you.
I’ve checked, and my readers are getting my comments. I understand the reason for this post though, I get a little annoyed when I leave a thoughtful comment and never receive so much as a boo or return to my blog.
you’re good, andrea!
Agreed…. I think I need to check… thanks for the reminder… XO, love.
~A~
amber, i’m not sure if i get your responses. so double check!
Thanks for the reminder. I try to.
patrick, turn off your captcha!
I haven’t checked lately…but sometimes people respond back to my comment, so I think I am good. I should check though anyway…
I always get your Michelle!
you’re good michelle! gold star!
I need to do this. I spend the time to respond to all those comments, but who even sees the responses?
stefanie, i don’t get your responses. please check!
I’m currently really bummed with my comment system, and don’t think commenters receive notification, although I do comment on everybody’s blog who comments on mine. The designers of my theme have said there will be an upgrade to comments in January. I can’t wait!!
kristi, i know you spend the time to response to your commenters so i’m looking forward to your upgrade. yay!
Such a great tip Catherine! I am off to check ours right now, although I fear that our site is among those where the people don’t get the replies!-Ashley
yes, ashley, we need to get your replies! we’ve been missing out on the response love!
Thanks for the reminder, Catherine. It’s something I need to, and have been meaning to, check on.
You’re good 🙂
alison, i get your responses. gold star!
Yes, please! I personally love getting the emails with the responses. I have mine set up and it seems to be working. I found it actually helped with return visitors as well.
gold star for you stevie!
I was just trying to figure out how to do that the other day! Does anyone know about how to set it up when using blogger? I love getting the emails and would love to do the same for others!
i’m a technical dunce when it comes to this stuff. here are two designers who can help. they are both fantastic and reasonable. this is like a flip of a switch, not a major project…so shouldn’t cost much.
allyssa@allyssabarnes.com
vanita@thestrategicmama.com
I am pretty confident that my readers get my replies–because I often start side conversation in emails! Great point thought because I often have to go back to my favorite blogs to see their response! I get yours though!
nellie, gold star for you and your responses to comments!
I will have to check, my sister swears to me that she gets the replies, but I have to wonder if she even knows what I’m talking about… I’m also 100% with you on the Captcha issue, I won’t comment if I have to jump through hoops. No thanks. My other pet peeve is blogger sites that don’t have name/url as an option when logging in the post a comment. I don’t need yet another site I have to register with just to comment! 🙁
yes jenny, double-check, because i’m not sure if i get your replies. there are just so many blogs that we read, we don’t have time to jump through hoops. it’s gotta be quick and efficient!
Picture me standing on a chair and cheering! I despise captcha! I swear I am an intelligent person who can read but it takes me a minimum of 3 tries to get captcha right every single time! I have no idea why!!
captcha is the bain of blogging! i’m with you, i can never get it right. it’s like…why must this be so hard?!
Clearly a lot of people took your advice to heart and are testing their blog. I tested mine and found out that I go two responses. They came as separate emails and look different than one another. Does this happen to you when I respond to your comments? I’m thinking this means I have comment reply turned on in two different widgets. The first thing on my to-do list for tomorrow is to figure this out! Thanks for the great guidance, Catherine!
yes, mo, i do get 2 replies from you. i figure 2 is way better than 0. as it’s easy to read one and archive the other. but glad you’re going to look into that.
I think I figured it out. I was using the Comment Reply Notification plugin which sent an email response and I also use Comment Luv which has the option to reply to comments. I didn’t realize Comment Luv included that feature nor did I realize that my webmaster had turned it on. You should just be getting one reply from me now. Thanks again to bringing this to all of our attention!
Since I’ve gone the non-technical route with Blogger, that means that I primarily respond just directly through email, since that seems to be the best way through the basic blogger commenting system. Although, I do have a few readers who aren’t bloggers but leave comments who have told me that they like to get their replies in the comment section, and that they will go back and check the post, so that’s what I do for them!
interesting, is there really no way to respond via blogger? i’m sure there’s got to be a way. here are two designers i’m sure can help, you can email and ask. they are both fantastic and reasonable. this is like a flip of a switch, not a major project…so shouldn’t cost much.
allyssa@allyssabarnes.com
vanita@thestrategicmama.com
Oh the email comment reply thing is such a pain! Great tips! I hate Captcha. It is the worst! I think what actually annoys me more is when there is no option to comment with a name/url. I end up having to comment with my google account, which usually means I have to sign out of my personal account and into my blog account. Drive me nuts!
captcha needs to be banned! i think i’ve told several people to ditch it, but it still seems to linger. at some point, i really will stop commenting if i need to do captcha. too much stress for one little comment.