Warning: Not at all related to personal finance
One of my absolute favorite things about blogging is the comments. I love reading and responding to all your comments, and always try my best to do so in a timely manner. I’m not perfect, I’m sure there is a comment somewhere on this blog that I’ve totally missed. Still, I try to respond to each and every comment; even if I just say thanks or throw out a smiley face, at least it’s something. Why? If you’re going to be awesome enough to read something I wrote, then take the time out of your busy day to leave a comment—how could I not do the same for you?
I know that other bloggers get way more comments than I do, and replying to each comment would consume their lives. That’s understandable and to be expected. But over the last year, I’ve been getting so frustrated with it. So many bloggers never respond to comments, and some just respond to a couple. I’m not saying that I leave brilliant comments or anything like that, but still. I’m not going to say which blogs, but off hand I can think of 5 that have never responded to a single comment I’ve left. Yep, I go check. Of those 5 blogs, there’s probably at least 20 posts I’ve commented on at each blog. What the h*ll?
If it bugs me so much, you’d probably say stop reading their blog, or stop leaving comments. I know, and I’ve really been working on it. I just don’t understand why they allow comments in the first place if they have no intentions of responding. Really. Do they even read their comments? Why not just skip the blog and go for a website? I don’t know what’s going on in their heads, and maybe they have some great reason for ignoring the people who comment on their blogs. Just thought I’d share my frustration with you guys; maybe I’ll feel better after venting.
Do you ever notice this?
Does it drive you mad?
I completely understand what you are talking about. I like to respond to all my comments too. I think even a quick thank you shows that I do appreciate the time it takes to comment on someone’s blog. I do understand why some only respond to a few comments but with that said being consistently ignored is infuriating.
I feel like I have built a great relationship with other bloggers just by leaving comments, both on my blog and on theirs. I find that to be the most exciting part of blogging.
I’m so happy that I’m not the only dealing with this. The interaction is definitely what makes blogging exciting for me too.
I do enjoy a good rant! I’m completely behind you. What about this scenario:
You pour out your heart on someone’s article in the comments. They respond with a 3 – 5 word shallow sentence. I’ve got to say, it turns me off. On my site I sometimes write 100+ words in response to comments, haha. I do like the fact you reply to me here.
I DEMAND a reply, haha!
haha. I try to keep my replies as short and simple as I can, because I can go on forever sometimes. One of my replies was so long I had to delete it and do it as a post. lol. It’s also nice to know that if I go comment on your posts I’ll get a reply. 😉
I try to read everything and I comment on as many as I can add something to the discussion. I even reply to the comments. I love it when I get a lot of traffic and comments.
It’s definitely fun to get lots of comments. That’s one of the things I love about your blog, aside of course, from the posts that really get me thinking about myself.
Im guilty of this
I really do try and be more responsive to comments in my blog. Just some times I get overwhelmed and that just gets put on the back burner. I should be more of a priority to me as I teach it in my wordpress class to be more interactive. I dont get a lot of comments and I should reward those that do comment.
I do read and appreciate every comment I get. Thanks for giving me a kick in the ass
At least you try. When I get overwhelmed, my commenting and networking efforts get put on the back burner—I’m sure you’ve noticed. I didn’t know you teach a wordpress class, that’s really cool.
yep I teach basic SEO and how to get a wordpress site up and running, mainly to other photographers but may be branching out soon (multiple streams!)
I could have used you 1 1/2 years ago.
I’ve been bad about responding to comments lately. Sometimes it’s justified, like when someone just comments “Good idea!” or something. But when there’s a thoughtful comment, I want to respond. I’ve noticed if I can’t reply immediately (like as soon as I get the email notification), I tend to forget to go back to it. Since I reply to comments from my email, I usually don’t actually visit my site to see all the comments – if I tell myself I’ll do it when I get home, it’s already gone from my brain by the time I get there.
If you have ever commented on my site without a response, I apologize! I’m trying to be less scatterbrained, I promise!!!
A lot of comments don’t really leave you with something to reply to, so what can you do. I have to respond right when I notice too because I’m such a scatter-brain—with everything. You don’t think I wrote this post about you, do you? It’s just an overall thing that drives me nuts, I’m not trying to call anybody out, just b*tch about it and increase awareness.
know it was about me 😉 You leave wonderful comments on my blog (probably my top commenter) and I dont always reply back
makes me feel bad
lol. Wonderful? I have such issues posting comments, I’m always like “that sounds so dumb” or “does that even make sense”. Most times I end up deciding that my comment is retarded and nobody wants that posted on their site.
Well it’s easy for me to reply to the comments on my site, since I typically have so few of them. And when you’re just starting a blog, you might even want to run an ad to ask for comments, lol.
I think it becomes more complicated as your blog gets more and more popular. I think that a lot of bloggers might feel overwhelmed by the amount of comments and just don’t respond. Then again, you DO end up noticing the frequent commenters and it would be nice to at least acknowledge someone who’s commenting on your site for, say, the 5th time.
And I thought I was the only one who went back and checked to see if people reply to my comments!!! Glad to know I’m not the only weird one, LOL
Glad to know I’m not the only weird one too.
I agree, if I was getting like 50 comments a day, I can image that getting really overwhelming, but I’d still do my best.
I read every single comment, and try to comment to everything that I can respond to. Sometimes I genuinely don’t have anything clever to say, but I always visit the blogs and comment there.
Also, I love rant posts!
Sometimes you’re not really left with anything to say, which is totally okay.
Visiting the blogs and then also leaving a comment is like going above and beyond. I try to do that too, but I suck at it. I have such issues with my comment confidence and get so wrapped up with all the busyness of my day to day life that I get behind on commenting.
I’ve actually been meaning to go over to your blog (love your banner by the way) and check out a couple of posts, but right now I have to go make dinner. Then I’ll have to do the dishes and make sure my daughter gets ready for bed and blah, blah, blah. It’s just ridiculous sometimes, but you are on my list and I will get there…eventually. 😉
Awww. I know what you mean. Blogging can be a fulltime job easily.
It really can, but I love it…just need more time in the day.
Yes.. this annoys me too. It’s a pain when you spend time replying to posts and you don’t even get acknowledged. But on the other hand, responding to hundreds of comments could be a bit crazy. I’ve seen some bloggers deal with that by replying to several comment in one comment.
Yeah, I couldn’t imagine having hundreds of comments to reply to, that would be nuts. But even the smaller bloggers do it too and I just don’t understand their logic.
I completely know what you mean. I like to think I’m good at responding to comments but I know that I’m lacking sometimes. I do have a hard time responding when someone says something like “hey, I’m glad it went well” when that proves that a) you clearly didn’t read the entire post and b) you’re commenting solely for the purpose of the Comment Luv link . How do you respond to that?
I tend to respond to all my comments during a designated time each day. It’s hard to keep going back and forth, so each morning, I take about 1/2 hour or so to respond to any comments I get. I don’t get thousands but I do get an amount that I’m happy with and 1/2 hour seems to be a good amount of time to respond. How can you foster a community if you don’t respond to your readers? It makes no sense.
And for the record, I appreciate your comments on my site, Jen!
Awwww, thanks. I spend a lot of my time online during the day, so I just respond to comments whenever I realize they’re there. I think doing it only once per day, like you do, would probably increase my productivity…I might try it one of these days.