Wednesday, May 11, 2011

Comments and Replies


Okay, I need to pause here and ask about blogging etiquette with regards to comments and replying to them. Now that I want to reply to comments more often, I want to be sure the commenter actually gets my reply.

I’ve known some bloggers who make the trip over to your blog and make a reply via the comments on whatever post you have up. Something like – “In regards to your comment on my blog post about such and such, blah, blah, blah…”

And then I see blog authors use a comment within that same post to make a reply. Something like – “@Lisa: I know what you mean, blah, blah, blah…”

I’ve done both those and I’ve written posts addressing everyone’s comments.

I don’t know what I’m doing.

I know WordPress does things a bit differently and allows specifically for a reply to a comment, but Blogger doesn’t.

Do you “subscribe” to the comments and then get an email when other comments are left? Do you check back on a comment you made to see if there was an author’s response? This I hadn’t done until very recently.

I’m just looking for your feedback on how you do it and what you’ve found that works best. Thank you!!

One note about yesterday’s post – I reread it later in the day and cringed. The grammar was horrible! Run on and on and on! Grammar has never been my strongest skill, but I try to edit and clean things up before I post them. Clearly I did not have my wits about me at 5:00 AM, because I pushed the Publish button before I did my editing. I usually set it up to publish about 7:00 AM just so I can look at it again after I’ve had a shower and some coffee. 

Oops! Not this time J.

3 comments:

  1. I tend not to check back at a blog, and I don't subscribe so that I get follow-up comments.

    Usually if someone leaves a comment to which I want to respond, I'll look for their email address first. Failing that, I'll go to their most recent blog post and reply that way. But I prefer to send an email reply and keep any follow-up off the blog.

    Once in a while, if it's a good discussion topic, I'll go back and read other replies, respond with a further comment. But that's rare.

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  2. Oh, I am constantly behind in commenting...I think it will be like that til I retire, hahameow.

    I have to approve comments before they show up on my blog, so often I will just go to the commenters blog and leave a comment saying thanks for the visit etc. If it's more 'personal' which is rare for me, then I will email them personally if I can find their email addy on their profile. I do see many people who post a comment on their own blog post responding to each commenter and that is nice for us to read but I follow so many blogs that most of the time I fail to follow up and see what they said about my comment. I like the idea of 'blogging without obligation' which I see as a badge on some blogs. Sometimes I think I should 'weed down' my blogroll and only follow those who leave comments, but then I would miss out on much news that way...

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  3. As a blog reader, I usually forget to go back and see if there are other comments on the topic, whether to my comment or others'. If I can subscribe to the comments, I usually do, to circumvent my forgetting.

    As a blog owner (WordPress - but I don't think people can subscribe to comments at my blog?), if I reply to a comment, I reply on my blog and often also alert the commenter via their email that I have replied (or I send them a duplicate of my reply).

    That's probably as clear as mud. Good luck!

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I welcome your courteous comments and observations.