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Blah blah blah blah great content.
Blah blah blah blah regular postings.
That may get you some readers and some respect. But it won’t make you sexy!
Here’s what will:
Responding to comments made on your blog and commenting on other blogs!
It’s hot! Commenting shows the world that you’re not the outcast you think they think you are.
Just think, a real person read your post and found it compelling enough to take the time to compose a note to you. Not a generic note, a personal one just for you in response to something you wrote. It’s quite a big deal actually. It’s a little gift for you in your mailbox. Are you maybe too cool to comment? That’s not cool, that’s just lonely. Buzzkill. For both you and me.
I’m not sure people realize they have the option to disable comments, that way any thoughtful, interested commenters won’t bother them. Some blogs do have their comments turned off, but it’s usually because they have become very big and the blogger no longer wishes to deal with the volume of comments. And if you don’t throw your readers a crumb now and then in the form of a comment, you are assuring that a healthy readership will never burden you. Following are some more reasons that commenting is sexy. It’s not mysterious—but expect magic.
- Discussing your views shows that you’re mature enough to interact like a grownup but still have a life-affirming sense of adventure. You like to meet new minds. It gives you a boost because humans are your species. Remember, before everything else, people wrote letters.
- Commenting shows you have good manners. It’s classy.
- Commenting shows you have sensitivity. Women love that. It’s a big turn-on for everybody. Humans like to think that someone gives a shit about they think.
- Commenting shows you have style. Communicating with another blogger can be daunting but you overcome it. It’s a risk, but isn’t it a small one? It takes a bit of grace and tact. We fall down. We get up.
The sexiest blogger I know has white hair and is happily married! But because he always responds to comments in an articulate and respectful way, and is a pleasure to exchange ideas with, he wins the honor. And recently I have met a few sexy bloggers who do not even have photos posted, so I don’t know what they look like. So you see it doesn’t matter. Okay I admit I’m curious.
I know it’s not easy. But just try it—it’s like adding a daily shake of sparklies to your life. I’m pretty sure that’s why people do it, right? Enliven thyself!
Find an Outlet 
I think commenting on other blogs and responding to comments made on one’s own blog is a habit pattern that is both courteous and mature (as you wrote). Some comments made on my blog I have turned around and posted as a separate article. I like also to see commentators rift off on their relevant tangent. I think posting a photograph of one’s self is important, too. For me, I can remember a face better than a non-personal gravatar so that when I respond to a post I can visualize at the end of the keyboard, through the blogging ether, a person, not a dis-embodied post. Ideas are corporeal first, then voiced, then written. I write to people, not the computer.
To be sure, the written word without a photograph is inspiring and I have studied and learned from the printed word without visual reference to the author. Yet, when you drill down into composition, you seek to know about the author and that includes a photo. Or, before photography, you sought a painting or sculpture, surrounding your study with busts and sketches of the writer.
I posted my photograph on my blog several weeks after I started writing posts last year. I’ve changed it from time to time, depending on the content. WordPress has these feature (just activated) that your gravatar on the sidebar will show all of your gravatars that you have through various systems, as well as other blogs an author may have. I’ve seen your photos, Debra, as I scroll over your gravatar on my comment section. It’s a good personal touch. I like this new WordPress feature.
I’ve gone on longer than I intended and must go to Blackboard now and commence raising the level of my students’ confusion as well as my own.
Jack, yes. Tangential comments often do lead to further reflection and to a new post, though it may not happen immediately, it’s stored for future use.
I do like to see pictures, it’s true. But if people don’t post photos, there must be a reason…shyness?
I’m having trouble arranging the damn gravatar, but I like the new ways it’s being used too. It’s definitely a presence. Sometimes I click on a blogger’s gravatar and it gives no information at all, so I can’t even find them…it’s frustrating because of our inquiring minds!
Hi Deb,
I love comments and wish people would comment more on my blog. Interaction is important for the writer to learn who their readers are, what works, what doesn’t, and the writing improves overall with feedback. As a commenter, I am sporadic I admit.
As for photo’s, I always feel so self-conscious about my looks that I tend to avoid cameras. I also usually avoid using my real name (which is unique) as much as possible since, well, years ago I was a victim. I still have that fear I suppose. It is something I am still working on since I think being who I am, real name and all, and showing photos will enhance the blog.
See, great post and without the comment I probably would never have thought further about photos! Thanks again Deb!
Cool, your name coming up! Now I can say hi Marita! I wouldn’t be hiding a beautiful name like that—but I know stuff takes time to work out. Crying Mustard, where are you?!
Agreed, interaction benefits our writing, what works, etc. Why publish your writing and then isolate yourself? It doesn’t make sense.
Thanks for comments hon.
Hi Debra, great post.
I am in full agreement with you on answering your commenter’s. To me it seems an indispensable part of what we do. In some respects small blogs like ours tend to make us friendly with our readers. We try to write about things that are interesting to us and like minded people find our blogs and come back again and again (hopefully). Except for the obviously demented commenter’s, I treat them as friends…for they are in many ways.
I find that I learn a lot from the people who post opposing answers to my blogging. My blog is primarily about religion and atheism and I always like it when the religious get into “arguments” with me. It seems to open up doors to thoughts that I hadn’t considered before.
I have one guy back on the Eastern seaboard who I have been “arguing” off and on with for about three years. He is pretty religious, as is his wife. I think some of my arguments have shifted his position on some Biblical matters and I know that some of his thinking has rubbed off on me and caused me to lighten up somewhat. I really respect him and his thinking and surmise we could be good friends in real-life if we didn’t live so far apart.
I have a *very* Catholic correspondent who I go to for answers to matters about Catholicism and theological thought that I am not well versed on. He is very knowledgeable and I almost always come away with new information and insight. He is probably pissed with me though as I have come down hard on Catholic pedophilia and advanced the thought that the Church is evil and very badly managed. However I really like him.
Continue on with your blog…I enjoy it very much.
Twom/Bill
Non-commenters have a different agenda, what it is I do not know. I see such despair sometimes, and I write, and nothing. Though it is not my problem, I do wonder about them.
Demented commenters (LOL) have made me more cautious—and also have made me more appreciative of thoughtful commenters. You are very rational and sound in your responses to them so it’s a life lesson for sure, as well as an art. When you say what you think, as you do, you will get backlash, and you can use them for practice!
I started my blog because I wanted to start a dialogue and conversation with the world (or a micro world) with those who have something important to say & share. And I suppose it’s like forming a kind of ‘relationship’ with other bloggers. I have a lifestyle that’s challenging on my time and a job that requires me to ‘shake out my head’ before I click back to the ‘real me’. And this means replying to comments and posting them requires effort – but the thing is – it’s a worthwhile, enjoyable and rewarding effort – as with many worthwhile relationships you often get back a lot more than you put in – E x
Well you’re managing to juggle it all, I don’t know how. The global dialogue we are able to access with our fingertips is amazing and definitely worth it. I think it’s more of an effort for you because you have so many commenters— well you rocked ’em, now you gotta pay! You know they’re precious. Where else can we have this much fun sitting in a chair that’s not in a bar?
In the spirit of being sexy…
I love reading your blog. Very often after reading, I find myself looking at things in a completely different light. It is always refreshing to gain perspective, to be able to see things from someone else’s point of view. After reading this, I realize… how would you even KNOW how much your words can inspire, unless I tell you?
So, thank you – not only for putting a new spin on the act of commenting, but for blogging. Thank you for reminding me to encourage those whom I read, as their words and stories often provide me with personal challenges, new insights and always entertainment.
Commenting is definitely encouraging – it lets the blogger know that they are read. Which, I believe, most bloggers crave.
❤
Hi Evie, thank you so much for letting me know—see, I had no idea!
Yes I feel very strongly about the art of communication—with myriad conversations going on at any moment on every subject imaginable, why not jump in and join the discussion. When bloggers do not answer comments, it usually feels like rejection to me, so a blog would have to be really, really, good for me to keep going back if the author ignored me. If an author is suffocating under the huge bulk of comments he/she receives, well that’s different! But sometimes I even write to authors of popular fiction if their book has touched a nerve—and believe it or not, they answer! It’s very exciting to hear back from a well-known author—they need feedback too just like us.
Thanks for writing, it made my day.
Debra
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