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Here are some strategies you can start using immediately to boost your comment count. I’ve used them both on my own blog and the blogs of my clients, creating dozens of posts that have crossed the 100 comment threshold, so I know they work:
1. Get visitors to subscribe. Many readers won’t comment the first time they visit your blog. They need to get to know you first. To give them a chance, get them to subscribe to your blog by offering them an incentive like a free report, video, or webinar. Over time, the dividends are enormous, not only in additional comments but also in traffic and revenue.
2. Emphasize email over RSS. On average, the engagement of subscribers to your email list is about four times higher than subscribers to your RSS feed. More engagement means more comments, so emphasize email and make that RSS button a little harder to find.
3. Publish less often. The more often you publish, the less comments your posts will receive (on average). For one, the number of new comments a post receives drops dramatically when it’s pushed off the front page, but also, readers tend to get overwhelmed when you’re publishing a lot of content. By publishing less often, say once a week, you can actually increase your engagement, and therefore, your comments.
4. Email your unopens. If you email your subscribers a post, and they don’t read it, they must not be interested, right? Wrong. They may have overlooked it, been too busy to read it, or failed to receive it because of some technical glitch. So, here’s what to do: use an email service provider like AWeber that tracks who opens your emails, and email the post again to subscribers who don’t open it. You’ll get more traffic, and as a result, more comments.
5. Ask for links. Did you know not all traffic is created equal? When you get a link from an authority in your niche, the visitors are much more likely to comment than visitors who stumble across you on search engines or social sharing sites. So ask for links. Just hit them up on Facebook or Twitter and explain how the post will help their audience. Don’t be pushy. Offer it as a resource. You’ll be surprised how often they link to you.
6. Revive the archives. As a blogger, it’s all too easy to constantly be focused on the next post and forget about the great posts you wrote weeks, months, or years in the past. But it’s a mistake. Most of your audience won’t have read those posts, and so linking to them will not only help your readers, but it will get those old posts more comments as well. My recommendation: try linking to one old post per day on Twitter and Facebook, and set up an autoresponder sequence to send your best posts to new subscribers as well.
7. Write with more passion. When I write, I like to imagine the reader is sitting at their computer, half-asleep, and my job is to wake them up and get them energized. To do that, I get myself energized, and then I write with so much passion and energy they can feel it. It rubs off. If you believe passionately in what you’re talking about, it’s like connecting jumper cables from yourself to the reader and then revving your engine. You’ll wake them up and get them to comment.
8. Assault the norm. Controversy is probably the most reliable tool for getting people to comment, but you have to use it in the right way, or you’ll offend your readers. Here’s how to do it right: assault the norm. Find the commonly held belief in your niche that’s actually a myth or flat out wrong, and tell people why you disagree with it. You don’t have to be aggressive or try to provoke an argument. The more thoughtful the post is, the better it will do. For an example to model, click here.
9. Tell a tearjerker. You want a surefire method for getting people to comment? Well, here you go: make them cry. Tell a story that’s so sad, inspiring, or downright upsetting that it brings readers to tears. A good rule of thumb: if you tear up just thinking about it, it probably has a shot. The only problems with this method is you do have to be a good storyteller to make it work, and most of us don’t have more than a handful of tearjerker stories, so you can’t depend on them all the time.
10. Attack a common enemy. Politicians use this one all the time. The idea is simple: identify a person, company, or culture your audience hates, and then let them have it. Write a good old-fashioned rant. If you do it right, you’ll be a hero, because you’ll be giving voice to the anger and frustration your audience feels but can’t express. Not only will you get “I’m so glad you said this” comments, but you’ll strengthen your bond with your audience, transforming readers into converts who will hang on your every word.
11. Give a pep talk. This one is my favorite, and here’s why: the disease that cripples people and holds them back isn’t so much a lack of knowledge as a lack of confidence. They simply don’t believe in themselves. You can give them all the greatest information in the world, but they’ll either gloss over it or quickly forget, because their internal response to everything you say is, “I could never do that.” The solution? Be the one person in their life who truly believes in them, and end your posts with a pep talk about how they can do it. You’ll get more “thank you” comments than you’ve ever seen in your life.
12. Respond to the comments you do get. You may not realize this, but many of your commenters are expecting a response, and I’m not just referring to the ones who ask questions. They might elaborate on one of your points, tell a story from their own life, or simply thank you for the post, none of which obviously need a response. But respond anyway. They’ll be excited to get a response from you, and it’ll encourage them to comment more in the future. (Admittedly, this is an area where I could do better.)
13. Ask a question that’s easy to answer. The favorite closing paragraph of lazy bloggers is some variation of “What did I miss? Leave it in the comments.” And almost always, the close falls flat. Here’s why: it requires people to think too hard. Finding an example or a point you missed requires substantial thought, and if they’re not already super engaged, most people decide it’s not worth the effort. The solution is to ask questions like “What frustrates you?” or “What’s your favorite tool for such and such?” Those types of questions require almost no thought to answer, and so they get a lot of comments.
14. Resort to bribery. If all else fails, bribe them. Give away free products, consultations, feedback, the new iPad — pretty much whatever your audience desires. By getting people to comment, you employ the Law of Consistency, which means if people do something once, they’re much more likely to do it again. Commenting also makes readers feel more a part of your community, and they’re more likely to stick around, tell their friends, and buy your products and services. So, sometimes it’s worth giving them a little incentive to get off their butts and comment.
Taken from: https://smartblogger.com/more-comments/
