Interacting and initiating a positive relationship with your Commentators

Visitor comes first. Get more visitors. Get targetted visitors. Well now you have them, but how can you convert them to your loyal readers? In this post I will share my views on this topic. I believe by interacting and initiating the positive relationship with your commentators can get you a strong loyal reader base.

From the past 3 months that I have been blogging regularly on this blog, I have got to know so many people. These people read my blog regularly, they are in my subscriber list, and they also stay in touch with me via email. Now I thought I need to share some of my techniques because I got this question asked multiple times when people recieve my first email. How did I set that up. Yes, I bet you know about that email also. This is the email that gets sent out to my new commentators on their first comment. Basically this email is just a little thank you note I want to tell my users because I really appreciate each and every comment because it is you guys that keep me motivated.

Well if you are wondering how does my blog automatically send out an email to all new commentators on their first comment. Well it is a work of a great plugin by Justin Shattuck (His site is down right now). Basically this plugin send out a message only once to the new users, so it is not a spammy message. The more personalized the better. You guys already know how my message looks like. If you don’t that means you have never commented on this blog before. Try it and you will see.

I believe that Comment Relish is a great way to interact with your commentators because alot of people tend to reply to that email and they either introduce themselves, or ask me some sort of question. Either way, I get to know my readers and get to know what they like. This actually makes my problem easier because I don’t have to go do a big research to find out what my readers like because alot of you guys actually lead me to the right direction by asking me questions and giving me your suggestions and I appreciate it. Coming back to the point, this plugin is a great way to interact with your commentators.

DOWNLOAD COMMENT RELISH

Note: The download is from my server because the original site is down. Justin if you have issues with this please notify me and I will take it off from the download because I think such a nice plugin should not go to waste.

Now I know that there are people who don’t like this plugin for various reasons. For example Vijay of Siteguide wrote a post 3 ways not to use this plugin. Eventhough I respect his views and I understand where he is coming from, I certainly cannot agree with him. It is a personal choice and you have to make one for yourself. Some people like the response while others don’t. I am a type of person who likes to be appreciated. I want to know if I send a message that you recieved it, so an autoresponder actually assures me that you recieved the message, so I am happy with it. As long as you don’t spam me with multiple other emails. With this plugin it only sends out one message not more than one, so it is perfectly reasonable.

The second reason he mentioned in that post is very true. Desperate attempt of publicity. But it is not true for all. Vijay said that some people write in the email describing their blog is great and everyone must subscribe to it. Whereas others just say thank you in the email in a kind way. Now, you can ofcourse abuse this plugin, or you can use it wisely. Using it wisely means simply thank the user. Don’t advertise your other services. Kindly ask them to subscribe in the end of the email if they want to. Don’t say you are missing out on bunch of stuff and you are not cool and so on so forth. Just kindly give them an option to subscribe thats all.

The third reason he mentioned about “Not the best first impression” will vary from person to person. I believe if you mention in your email that this is the last time that user will ever recieve that message and they don’t recieve it ever again that definately means you are trustable. Some people like to be appreciated like me whereas others don’t expect that thank you like Vijay. Once again a personal choice.

I am not saying that Vijay is wrong because alot of people do think like he does. I am saying that it just varis from people to people, and you just have to pick your side. I think it is a great plugin to use if you want to interact with your users.

I know personally that I do check out all my commentator’s sites, or atleast I try. I do reply to comments when I find necessary. If my user email me, I reply to them as soon as I can, and I do my best to establish a good relationship with them. Now if you do all this and the comment relish, you are doing a good job.

So in the keynote, Get Comment Relish
Reply to all comments when necessary (Use Brian’s Threaded Comment)
Leave Quality Comments on your commentator’s blog (If it is a blog)
Check out your commentator’s website if you can.
Always reply to all emails you get from your users.

A good relationship with your commentators can get you alot because these are the people who will spread the words of your blog around the web. They will recommend you to their friends, family and colleagues. I am sure we all can use the mouth to mouth advertisement.