This post is by The Blog Tyrant.
My blog is only 22 posts old but I already get close to 100 comments on most of the articles I write. I recently wrote about how to increase conversions and got over 250 comments in about six hours. It’s a surprising amount.
So why is my blog getting so many comments? And more importantly, what can you do to replicate the commenting frenzy on your own blog? Let’s take a look.
Why comments matter
The first thing I want to talk about is why comments are important to a blog. It’s quite simple—one word in fact: community. Blog comments are a sign that your community is healthy and functional. The post I linked to above was the 18th article I had written on Blog Tyrant and I hardly had to participate in the discussion: my readers did it all. I just put up a post and watched my amazing community help each other out with their questions and concerns. I felt like a proud dad.
I’ve found that if you can increase comments on your blog, you’ll often find that traffic, subscribers, and all the other nice metrics rise as well. In fact, when I look in my analytics I see that the posts that get the most comments also do the most converting and bring the most visitors—not the other way around.
Let’s say that again: more comments lead to more traffic, conversions, and sign ups.
How I get people to comment
I want to share some simple little strategies that I use on my blog to get comments, and lots of them.
1. Close comments
Wait a second … close comments? Yep, close them. After two weeks I close off the comments on my posts so that people have to wait for a new post if they want to start commenting. Sounds counter-intuitive doesn’t it? In fact, just two weeks ago I got an email from another blogger who asked:
Why do you close comments on old articles? What if people want to add to the discussion? You may as well close comments entirely.
I visited his blog and, quite ironically, almost every post he has written has zero comments. Unfortunately this guy has underestimated the power of scarcity. People are much more likely to interact with a product or a blog if they perceive it to be scarce or limited. That’s why car companies release limited editions and the big clothing stores have “one day only” sales. If you close comments your comment section automatically becomes more alluring.
2. Show up every single day
At least once a day I get an email from a reader thanking me for personally replying to their comment. In actual fact, I make it a policy to reply to every single comment that I get on my blog, unless it has already had some good replies. I do this because I want to show my readers that I care and that I really like getting comments from them. Replying individually, every day, shows them that I am interested and the karma of that action is that they want to comment more often.
You might also see a slight trick here. By replying to every comment you also increase your comment count. So instead of having ten reader comments, you might have 20 with your own individual replies. Not all of my posts are like this but in some of them, 30-40% of the comments are from me. Tricky huh?
3. Write full and detailed articles … but don’t finish them
In my 7,809 word series on how to blog, I told my readers to write comprehensive articles but not to finish them. This little trick is something I picked up years ago when I decided to sell a blog for $20,000: long but incomplete articles really attracted a lot of interest amongst visiting traffic.
Here’s the deal. If you totally exhaust a topic, you leave your readers with nowhere to go. They already have all the answers from your post, so why would they comment? The reverse of this situation occurs if you write articles that are too short and incomplete. In that case, you aren’t going to rouse enough passion and interest in order to generate some discussion.
The ideal situation is to write comprehensive articles, but to not quite finish them. Don’t complete every topic and always finish the post so that the reader wants to learn more, research further, and talk to you about what you have written.
What’s worked for you?
Have you ever heard the saying, “the more you learn, the more you realize you don’t know”? I have been blogging for a long time but still, every day, I find new strategies and techniques to improve what I do. I get totally embarrassed by the fact that, after years of blogging, I still don’t know a thing!
Please leave a comment and let me know what strategies worked best for you on your blog. Is there any reason why your most commented articles did so well? Or is it totally random? I’m looking forward to hearing what the ProBlogger community has to offer!
The Blog Tyrant is a 25-year-old guy from Australia who has sold blogs for large sums of money and now writes about dominating your niche. Subscribe by email or follow him on Facebook and Twitter.
My First Comment on this blog and this post
Great idea about not finishing the article. I haven’t thought of that and also haven’t heard it suggested before.
Great post. It made me want to leave a comment!
Love the tip about closing comments after 2 weeks. Will try it out.
Question: how do you get those 5,000-10,000 people to read your blog post to get those 100-250 comments? What do you do to give the initial marketing push? I would be more interested in knowing that…
Thanks
Ankesh, if you have a presence on LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook, you will want to mention your blog posts, asking what people think, that you’d like their opinion, etc. I would not do this, however, if you don’t also converse in these spaces as most people don’t appreciate someone who only broadcasts and promotes their material without spending time talking to others. In your auto-signature in email, always update it with your most current blog post at the top so it will be noticeable to those you email. If you have a newsletter, mention your blog posts. Just a few thoughts….good luck!
I was wondering the same thing as Ankesh so thanks for the tips!
I like the idea of updating the email signature with the newest blog post. I would never had thought about it.
Interesting tips bro. I will certainly try it on my blog. What I really want to know is how to get more Google Backlinks and increase the traffic on a website.
Thanks for a great article.
With regards,
Rahul.
Asking for comments is not my favorable method via Social platforms. But you can always encourage your readers inside the post itself, to comment what they feel like.
What’s worked for me?
I’ve just posted a long article on how to get traffic on your site. Interestingly I’ve followed your advice prior to even finding this blog post in that I haven’t really finished it properly yet. Maybe I wont now.
One of the other ways is to comment on other blog posts with witty and appropriate comments. It’s all one big merry go round.
I’d never considered closing my comments after some time passes. Now that I think about it, however, I notice that any comments on older posts are spam. Looks like it’s time to test this theory out.
Like Ankesh, I’m curious how you get so much traffic to get commenters.
Hi Blog Tyrant.,
Another GREAT POST, I’ve been following up your blog since Nov last year.
I do practice reply comment policy and found my blog building up in size of the community.
It takes lots of effort to maintain the momentum. So far the outcome as not been encouraging !
The only problem i face is not able to attract enough people to visit my blog.
Cheers,
Ganesh
Thanks for these tips, I think they can really help me out. I basically starting a fresh new blog, just wanted to start all over and blog like I mean it.
I still have a hard time writing, but I guess I just need practicing writing.
Thank you so much, I hope these tips well help to roll in some comments and viewers.
@Nick, everyone (even Darren Rowse) started out with having a hard time writing and they still experience that from time to time. You are already on the right track with practising… then you probably should find a writing style (look for a blogger whose style you like and imitate. After a while, you’ll find your own voice). Don’t worry, stick it out and it would get better eventually.
Brian Clark once gave some advice on becoming a better blogger:
Read, read, read, read, read, reader, write.
Hi,
Spot on. Agree with what Brian says.
When I started out, I thought who gonna read my blog?
I just kept going and going. Now, at least I understand what I’m writing.
Ha!Ha!
Anyway, this post really beneficial for those who wants to start a blog and get more comments.
Thank you so much, just take times to find your voice I guess.
Thanks guys for all the replies.
I do enjoy writing and getting my word out, but the problem I have is when say I’m writing about a tech story on something and when there is going to be thousand other more popular blogs covering the same story, why would mine matter?
I’ve asked some people that you should make yours stand out and I understand that but I just don’t know how to do that. I’m not even looking forwarding to getting paid, I honestly don’t care about that, I just want to get my name out there and say “hey everyone, I’m here!”
I know that I should find an area that I like, but the problem is that I like them all!
I honestly don’t know what I’m doing, and if it’s a waste of time, maybe I should just keep doing it anyways cause I don’t have anything else to do.
Anyways, Thanks so much.
Really interesting points, especially regarding closing comments… really thought provoking – thank you! My biggest concern as a blogger is allowing users to comment easily. The easier it is the better. Facebook integration has been useful so far but I want to look beyond that…
Great article, will implement commenting time limit and see how it affects commenting. I’m yet to be successful at engaging readers to comment.
Thanks.
Well, I can’t say I don’t agree, for I don’t actually write articles, hehe. I post images (my wallpapers) on my blog, however, I feel, I have to drag my visitors to the “like” or “tweet” or comment button.. :'( Even though most people who actually visit my site are always super positive about my images and actually recommend them to others… What’s keeping them from clicking those buttons? Because the very few tweets I’ve got (3) have always created an explosive boost in visitors.
I want to add “show your support by sharing or commenting” or something like that, but I don’t want to sound like a begger :-)
It’s frustrating to see some very weird or pointless posts (or just plain old copy-pasted blogposts) on the web have +100 tweets and 2k likes while I put so much effort in what I do… for free
WHat do you suggest? I like to keep my page as minimalistic as possible though, maybe that’s my mistake?
It can be very costly not to complete your articles. Discussion is good, but satisfaction is the discussion you want.
Asking questions at the end of a blog post (like you did in this post) is also a great way to get people talking.
I liked what you said in particular about the ‘scarcity’ mindset, we try to work that in as much as possible in business.
It really seems like a fluke what has worked best and what hasn’t, but I know that there are generally three things that will make a person leave a comment: when they are asked, if they trust the writer or if they want to debate it.
Going with the third one, debating it, writing about a topic that could be debated can also generate a ton of comments.
Thanks for a great post!!
I agree with most of this post except for the closed comment part. I get new followers finding my blog all the time and every once in awhile they will comment on an old post. Sometimes those new opinions on an older post spark something in my mind, inspiring new post ideas for me. I’d hate to shut those people out, penalizing them just because they are new followers.
I don’t really think people are consciously commenting on a post right away in fear of losing their chance to be heard. They comment when they read it, if they feel the need, and thats it. But stats tell you after 2 weeks a post is only getting a fraction of the hits it did in its initial week since there is newer, fresher content for your regulars to read so obviously the comments trickle in much slower on old posts.
And I do get plenty of comments.. each of my posts in 2011 have at least 55 comments, with the exception of yesterdays post which has 47 right now and I’m sure will be well over 50 by the time my next post hits later today.
I do agree completely with leaving your posts “unfinished” so that readers have something to add. If you are posting about a topic that is subjective, with everyone having an opinion (such as boxers or briefs, Coke vs. Pepsi, etc) then people will always want to share their thoughts.
SD
Hey SD.
Great comment.
I wonder if you closed comments on the older posts whether you’d have more people coming up to the new stuff, etc.?
I totally get your point though. It was a big concern of mine too.
So you’ll still close comments or make them available always?
Enjoyed reading the post. I noticed that interacting with my readers in the comments section is making a huge difference. People I reply to tend to come back and comment on new posts as well.
Another thing I’ve done is to simply ask them their opinion at the end of the blog post – similar to what you’ve done here.
Hey Susanne.
Does that bottom grey subscribe box convert well on your site?
I once asked my blog friends to give me suggestions to make my blog more interesting. They came flying in, and people disagreed with other.
I got a huge response, and got some great new ideas for: http://www.joyofdirectmarketing.com
I must say 250 comments in 6 hours is quite impressive! And I perfectly agree with you: a lot of comments do matter.
I believe the easier way to get people to comment on your blog post is to ask them to. That’s right! You simply finish your article with a question like ‘what do you think about this’ or just ‘please leave a comment and let me know what you think’.
Great tip with closing the comments after a while. I’ll sure use that on my new blog.
Asking questions at the end of posts as you did here works for me in addition to the other techniques you mentioned. Great stuff Tyrant.
I have a social commentary site so while I might be providing some enjoyment I’m not really providing information. I do get comments but not as much traffic as I’d like. I think that responding to people’s comments on my site is a good idea. The thing is getting people used to that so that they come back and see how I responded. Creating a dialog generates interest. It’s something I need to be better about.
Added to all these tips, I think the fact that the blogger had been blogging for a while and his/her name is already established on the internet counts too.
So if you already have an established and successfully running blog, and if you start another blog, your new blog will attract a lot of comments. It is because the readers (70% of them, if not all of them) of your established blog(s) automatically become readers of the new blog.
Thanks for the nice article anyway.
Jane.
That is probably true for guys like Darren.
I have to agree 100% here. I wonder if Blog Tyrant could do a study and see how many of the posters are also commenters on their other sites versus new readers. It’s kind of like successful blogger writing “How I got a million billion subscribers to my new blog” posts then listing tips but failing to mention they already had five million billion readers from their other blogs.
Once you have a successful brand you can’t act like your new product is a “from scratch” site. The good will you created from years of hard work on your previous products are what is driving the traffic, not gimmicks with turning off the comments.
Actually Blog Tyrant was totally from scratch.
The first tip is indeed very interesting. I’m going to try that out and see how it works. I already try to end my posts with questions to raise discussion, but I hardly get any comments :(
Thanks for the article, I’ll definately be checking your other ones out. My traffic is okay, as I’m just starting out. (I have more then 18 blogs but still consider myself as new in the field) But my comments? Almost non- existent.
We close comments after 30 days, but maybe we’ll try doing so after 14 days and let’s see what happens.
Excellent tips there. My blog comments seem to go up and down in phases. Perhaps I should close them off after a couple of weeks like you do. I also like the idea of writing longer posts but not finishing them to stimulate more conversation. Food for thought :-)
I hadn’t heard of your blog before but I have added it to my RSS reader now.
David
Thanks David. Hope you enjoy it.
Hi Blog Tyrant,
Thanks for your tips. By the way, I would like to ask what do you exactly mean by writing comprehensive content but don’t finish them? I would love to do it, but I’m a little unsure what you mean by ‘don’t finish them’ hah. Does it mean you give ‘5 tips’ only, instead of the usual ‘7 tips’..etc?
Thx B.T :)
Great tips, especially the one about closing comments. The other I appreciate is commenting on each comment. I would LOVE to do this, but Squarespace, my platform, doesn’t have comment threading so unless I monitor comments all day long and respond immediately, I end up having to do a mass group reply commenting to each in one giant reply. I’ve tried disqus but it renders my older comments invisible (and I have thousands of comments so that’s not a good option). Instead, I reply directly via e-mail to the new commenters then drop a comment now and then on the post. Keeping my fingers crossed Squarespace will soon come through on the promise to have comment threading.
Isn’t that strange that Squarespace don’t have that functionality. I thought they’d be all over it!
I like the mass reply – one comment where you address everyone like:
@Lisa
@Blog Tyrant
That way everyone gets to see.
I keep my comments open. Again I don’t want to force users out of a topic even if its “out of date”.
Thanks for the tip on Closing comments love the idea, what is the best way to action this? Is there a plug-in or a script for this.
Many thanks
If you are using WordPress then just go to your dashboard –> settings –> and then look for discussion.
Then look for the check box that says “Automatically close comments on articles older than ___ days”
Select your number and save.
Hope I understood your question correctly.
Wasim,
If you are running WordPress (as you appear to be) then there’s an option right under Settings > Discussion. “Automatically close comments on articles older than [ ] days”. There are other plugins available to do this kind of thing too, but this one works fine as it is if you just want a simple across-the-board solution.
Spot on!
I am using Blogger and find a bunch of even the basic functionalities don’t work for me much of the time. Simple things like “reactions”.
I don’t know how to enable replying to individual comments – I have to do the group reply like Lisa does.
I am also terrible at doing anything with the generic text and layout. I guess I need to educate myself better with html and Blogger functionality. I wish I could gain more followers!
This is why I love you Blog Tyrant!!
Is there a mechanism in wordpress where you can close the comments after two weeks?
I’ve never thought of applying the idea of scarcity to blog comments. These are all excellent ideas – I’ll have to try them out.
I am going to start putting all of these tips into practice and see what the results are.
80 comments on the next post would be the shortest amount of time to see results. What’s the longest you think it takes to start seeing results?
Great post!
Great tips. I have just started closing my comments on post over thirty days old on my blog. I have yet to notice any significant difference yet. But I plan on writing follow post later and will link the post together. Hopefully this will stimulate more comments as well.
Virgil
Great tips. And I love how you ended the post with a question. Asking people what has worked for them will definitely encourage people to comment. I too try to reply to everyone’s comments. I agree that it is important to let people know that you care what they have to say. I would love to sell a blog for 20,000. Now that is a post I am going to have to look at right now. Cheers
Hope you enjoy Deb.
Thanks for this article.
I very new to blogging as I’m still working on creating a community of fellow readers around my blog and trying to learn as much as I can on the way.
I’m going to try the “closed comments” technique on the future.
To write good articles but not finish them seems like a bit tricky. I see what you mean by that but either way the post has to be compelling enough for the reader to comment and that is the hard part, I guess.
Thanks for the information. I’ve been blogging for about a year, with little direction. My goal in 2010 was to refine my content and my 2011 goal is to target 2-3 specific areas well.
Thanks for your input about comments. I generally get very few, and those from the same readers. I guess my next project will have to be figuring out how to expose my site more broadly.
Thanks!
Exactly the post I need. I’ve been struggling for years to get people to comment on my blog posts. You seem to know what you’re doing and talking about so I’ll definitely give it a try.
I was really impressed when I saw about the 250 comments in 6 hours! I used to have a blog sometime ago, and the strategy I used was to update often, but not TOO often. Usually I have a new blog post every 2 days or so. This gives readers the time to go into the blog, read the post and comment if they are too busy the day before. Also, when I have “collected” plenty of followers, I open a post for them to state their location/occupation.
From this, I will be able to see what age group of readers am I attracting. For example, if I attracted most students, I will choose to blog a little less in the mornings when they are in school or during their exam period.
I hope this helps!
You don’t mention it in the post (eventhough you are doing it) but asking for your audience to relate to your discussion with their own story is key to getting tons of links.
Great post Tyrant!
Chris “The Traffic Blogger“
I just started my new blog last week (got my first post up) but in many other instances I have exercised scarcity in an ethical way.
I do have to admit, I’ve never even considered doing this for comments. Sounds like it’s been effective for you.
Thanks for sharing Blog Tyrant and I’m impressed with your readers engagement on your blog.
TheRealHuman: Real Human Behavior
Hi Human,
Good luck with your new blog (I started mine too at the beginning of the year). Maybe I’ll become a regular reader of yours – I had a 3-week hiatus from doing the same as your first blog post because of the snow!
I will have to try out the closing comments….very interesting…Try ending your post with a question and always asking for feedback.
I loved this post for many reasons.
Not only is it food for thought n gainin more comments, its also given me ideas for blogging. My blog is literally days old and i have been stuck on what types of post would generate followers but now i have an idea.
I can see how writing everyday and formin post to be interactive would help. And since ive personally been following blogs so long i kinda see this reference in the blogs i do comment in vs. The ones i dont. So thanks again
Love you all,
Nise T
After reading this, I took a moment to consider what was the factor in my two blog posts that have the most comments–both of them recent, btw. I realized that in both of them I shared a life experience in such a way that my readers felt compelled to share theirs in return. One was my rather sad experience with homemade laundry detergent, and I invited my readers to share their experience. They did. All ends of the spectrum! That post, incidentally, has been my most viewed post of all time, and most of the viewers came because they saw a link on another site. The topic must have been intriguing. I need to learn to do that more often!
The other one was about my experience with a son with eczema (the first in a series of posts–the next one coming out this Friday), and several people who could relate shared a brief version of their story with me.
It seems that when I write posts that my readers can identify with, many of them feel compelled to comment. Especially when I am opinionated on a topic. That urges other opinionated people to give their perspective.
Not finishing articles works, yes. And asking a question at the end of post too.
I love how readers love to comment when you let em know, it’s going to be a TMI (to much information) post.
Very interesting… things I never would have thought to try.
Tyrant thanks for the tips. Getting people to comment on my blog is difficult sometimes as they tend to post comments on Facebook instead. I totally agree with “showing up every day” – engagement really matters.
Thanks for the well written article. I am always surprised by the ways in which people are able to use tips and techniques to help their blogging. The bottom line, though, has to be “great content at all times”. Looks like you have it nailed. Well done.
I get the most “comments” on my blog from my friends on Facebook or people on Twitter… rather than commenting on my actual blog, they comment to me via social networking sites. Is this hindering me from gaining more traffic on my blog?
BT, great article as usual.
An easy method to leaving an article short of content is create a Top Ten list but leave number 10 empty. Or phrase it;
10: You tell me!
Great idea Chris!! Thanks! I definitely have to try that one:)))
I don’t have many comments on my articles – in general-. Mine is a celebrity blog….
But there is this particular article which has sparkled many comments. The reason : it was a controversial article, about whether or not Demi Lovato is emo. My point is that you shoul create a controversy in order for people to comment. Of course, it’s not a strategy for all types of blogs, as it depends on your niche…