creating a community with your blog

When I asked Jessica Smith, of Wish Pot & JessicaKnows fame (among many, many other things…), what one tip she would give someone just starting out in social media, she replied:

“Talking with people” may be easy to put into practice with sites like Facebook and Twitter. But you probably use your blog just to “talk to people.” It takes a bit more thought & a tiny bit of effort to turn your blog into a conversation – but it’s well worth it!

Community = Conversation = Comments

How do you feel when you receive a comment on a blog post? Pretty jazzed, right? Are you doing anything to encourage comments?

Comments are the currency of the blogosphere. Sure, impressions, page views, & unique hits are great – but if you’re not engaging your readership, what is your blog really worth? Engaging your readers means that they’ll keep coming back whether they’re ready to buy from you that day or not. They’ll be more likely to keep you in mind for a special gift or a personal splurge! Inviting & encouraging comments will keep your readers engaged.

Just as in life, the more you give, the more you get. Think about the blogs you visit regularly. Are you giving them the comments that you’d like to get? Leave a comment. Start a discussion. Point out something specific from the post you found helpful, eye-catching, or interesting.

Comment to Get Noticed

Commenting on others’ blogs is also a great way to get noticed by people who are in a position to promote you & your business. You read all your blog comments, so do I. And so do editors whose blogs have more readership than we could ever dream of! To encourage reader loyalty, you can even respond to your comments – by email, on your blog, or on the reader’s blog.

Ways to Encourage Comments

Encouraging comments starts with providing excellent content (that always keeps in mind your mission statement, of course!). New projects, special features, tours of your studio…anything that your customers can’t find elsewhere – these things all encourage comments by making your readers feel valued.

You can also increase the interactivity of your blog by asking for design ideas. girlscantell does an excellent job of this! Sara regularly collects reader input and then creates new designs based on the ideas! You can also have polls or ask for readers’ personal experiences. ProBlogger has even more ideas for increasing comments.

The readers who comment are most often your best customers & biggest fans. You certainly want to take every opportunity to reward them for being a part of your business! Add a link to their site in your sidebar. Thank them publicly, by name, in posts. Offer to answer reader questions in an open comments thread. Give your readers a piece of homework and have them report back to you ;)

What have you done to increase a sense of community on your blog?

Homework

Your homework for this post is really easy.

Craft a question for your readers to answer. Make this post 200 words or less. In other words, a little background information is fine but really make the question the feature of your post.

Let your readers know that you would really like to read their answers.

Then come back here and leave a comment with the permalink for your question post. Visit other HiP blog challenge participants and answer their questions.

Next week we’ll talk about writing better posts by incorporating the principles of search engine optimization.

You may also enjoy: the HiP blog challenge – episode 1 | blog, blogging, blogged: @weeklyblogpost & a challenge! | craft & community |