Do you remember the 2000 U. S. presidential election? In Florida, many ballots were punched incorrectly resulting in what was deemed as “hanging chads”. It was quite controversial as a huge number of votes weren’t being counted. Several recounts were performed and the situation ended with many disgruntled people.
As I was reviewing the A.S.K. – Liz Strauss – How Do You Inspire Your Readers To Join Your Community article, a comment written by Theresa Zagnoli said, in part:
I would however find it insulting if a writer responded individually to others, but not to myself.
This reminded me of a problem that occasionally happens in a blog’s comment section. Your comment doesn’t get answered.
Your comment gets left “hanging”.
Today’s Lesson
I see a few scenarios as to why this happens,
1) You’re “late for the party”. Late for the party meaning you’re one of the last ones to comment on a post, and the blog authors misses your comment.
2) Your comment ended up in your spam folder. Even though it gets fished out, the author gets busy and forgets to answer the despammed comment.
3) The author gets so many comments, they accidentally miss yours in the group.
4) You comment on an old post, and again, the author overlooks your reply.
As blog authors, we want our commenters to know their words are important to us. Missing those random comments could result in lost readers.
As much as I try to catch every comment, I know I’ve probably missed a few. For those commenters whose comments I’ve missed answering, I truly apologize.
Today’s Assignment
How do you ensure that you catch every comment?
What do you do when you miss one? Do you answer it, or leave it hanging?
Have you ever left a comment on another blog, not to have it answered?
If so, how did it make you feel?
Photo Credit: Rory Finneren’s photostream