Are You Still Trying To Crack The Code For Getting Regular Comments?

If YES, then this article may help you refine the choices you make, to include the use of only ethical practices to achieve your goal.

I’ve written it to offer guidance to blog owners or administrators who may feel pressured to get comments in at all cost.

My message is that an “all’s fair in war” or “anything goes” attitude towards getting visitors to comment on your blog, can actually hurt you more than it could possibly help you.

Is Your Blog Already Getting Regular Comments?

If yes, let me ask you the following questions:

1. How do you get visitors to comment on your blog on a regular basis?

2. What was your blog’s average comments count per post like when you initially launched out?

3. Were people always falling over themselves to post their comments?

4. Or did you have to go out of your way to get your readers to speak up.

Whatever Answers You Give To The Above, I Suggest You Avoid Using Any Of The Following Methods To Get Comments In

Let me make it clear that what I say here is my personal opinion.

Having said that however, I add that I’m not trying to preach at anyone from a position of self-righteousness.

Instead I challenge you to consider what your readers would think of you, if they found out that you use either of the methods I’ve advised against below.

If you know they will not be upset or disappointed to learn you use those methods, then by all means continue.

Otherwise, make needed changes.

Would You Go This Far, To Get Comments?

1. Comments Seeding?

This appears to be a method developed by well intentioned honest blog owners.

It is infact recommended by a well known, high income earning blogger, in an ebook on the subject.

The idea is basically to post comments on your own blog post, using an alias or possibly a pen name of some sort.

Your purpose would not be to deceive, but to stimulate the reader’s interest in posting a comment, by starting the process using your alias.

Those who advocate this approach argue that most readers may not wish to be the first to comment. And that they tend to comment on posts that aleady have one or two comments.

I say end your post with an invitation to comment or share thoughts on the post’s topic.

You could go further and offer gifts or prizes to encourage visitors to comment qualitatively and actively.

2. Buddy Commenting?

Yeremi Akpan touched on this method of getting blog comments in a recent post titled “Are You Committing Incest With Your Blog?”.

It occurs in various forms, but basically involves getting a group of friends, affiliate partners, and others in your network of regular contacts to commit deliberate effort towards commenting on each of your blog posts.

And you would return the favour to each one of them, whenever they publish their separate blog posts…:-)

I’m going to be blunt here:

I totally dislike this method. And I’ve come across enough blogs that use it, to know that it’s bad for the Internet’s content quality control.

For instance, when an uninitiated visitor to such a blog sees a high comments count on a post, she’s likely to anticipate it offers potentially useful content.

However, since buddy commenting is practiced on the blog, a real danger exists that poor quality posts may still enjoy a lot of “Great post. Thanks for sharing!” obligatory back-slapping buddy comments which NAUSEATE me so much!

Imagine just how let down a visitor would feel after arriving at that kind of post via a Google search?

If more of such blogs were to come up, trying to guage blog content quality, based on comments counts, would gradually become a waste of time!

Final Words

As a blog owner looking to jumpstart or boost comment counts on your posts, I recommend taking the high road from the beginning.

That way you’ll be free from conscience attacks of any sort, if nothing else.

If you already use either of the above described methods to get comments on your blog, I suggest you stop doing so altogether.

What You Can Do:

Based on what I’ve said above, the path to follow is obvious.

Use ethically responsible methods to get your readers to comment on your posts.

For ideas you can use, read my post titled “Is Your Blog Productive, Or Just Plain Busy? (Interesting Arguments For & Against Blog Comments)”.

It feaures links to articles by competent blogging experts like Matt Smith, offering sound advice you can reliably follow, to attract comments to your blog posts.

Goodluck.