A great post was put up here on Site Sketch in July titled “How To Get More Comments on Your Blog”. It outlined four ways to encourage people to comment on your blog and had some really good tips. This is a continuation of that post showing four more quick ways you can encourage comments on your blog.

1. Ask For Them

Let your readers know you want comments by opening your blog up for discussion. Ask questions of your readers that are relevant to the topic and will make people want to share their opinion. For example, after you list your favorite widgets, ask your readers what their favorites are. People are shy; letting them know you want to hear what they have to say will help.

2. Use Third-Party Comment Software

Using third-party comment software such as Comment Luv will give other bloggers a reason to comment: a little more exposure. Intense Debate will add a whole plethora of new features to your comment section to facilitate reader engagement. Using something such as Subscribe to Comments will make it easier to get people back to your website to continue commenting. There are lots of plugins available, make use of them.

3. Display Recent Comments

Showing recent comments in a prominent place on your website will help get people into the commenting mood. Nobody wants to be the first to comment on a blog, so displaying others doing it will ease people into the idea. It transforms a blog from a writer and reader atmosphere to a discussion. An added bonus in threaded comments is that it will give more content for somebody to reply to. They won’t only see what you have to say but they’ll see what others have to say as well.

4. Display Top Commenters

Everybody likes seeing their name up in lights. Once somebody starts to crawl up this list, they’ll have reason to keep going. And as we all know, more comments make people comment more.

A Note from Nick

Nicholas Cardot: I’ve met very few bloggers who don’t want comments on their articles.  They encourage us, they educate us, and they enlighten us to the needs and desires of our readers.  I’ve said it hear on Site Sketch 101 several times that comments are the life-blood of a successful blog.

So you want comments on your site?  Take these tips from Matt and put them to work for you.  Engage your readers.  Reward their comments.  Feed their ego.