Read enough about blogging, and you’ll see posts, comments and questions that typically sound like this:
“How can I get more comments on my blog?”
“My blog must suck, no one ever leaves comments.”
“So-and-so must be a better blogger than I am. He/she always get a ton of comments.”
And so on and so forth.
Just today yesterday on Active Rain (a large real estate network) there was a “featured post” titled, 10 ways to get more comments on your blog post.
It’s a good article, and I can’t really disagree with anything the author wrote.
But here’s the deal….
Does it really matter if your blog gets lots of comments?
The second article ever posted to this very blog you are reading right now was, What is Your Goal? In that post we discussed how your blog needs to have a SMART goal. Is “number of blog comments” a reasonable goal for a real estate blog?
Not in my opinion.
Don’t get me wrong. I LOVE getting blog comments. The interaction and learning they can provide are invaluable, and are part of what separates a blog from a static, “traditional” web site.
But let’s think this through…
My main blog, The Phoenix Real Estate Guy (TPREG), gets a reasonable amount of comments. Not in the amount of some mega-blog along the lines of Mashable, Tech Crunch, etc. but it does OK for a real estate blog.
Let’s look at a little data for TPREG:
From January 1 through October 31, 2010
- Unique visitors = 607,960
- Page views = 1.4 million
- Comments left = 3,086
Over three thousand comments left this year. That’s about 300 per month, or 10 per day. That doesn’t sound too bad.
But take a look at that visitor count and do some simple math…
607,960 / 3,086 = 197
So, one out of every 197 visitors leaves a comment. Or 1 comment for every 453 page views.
In other words, the vast majority of blog readers never leave a comment. Given that many people have commented dozens of times, the actual number of visitors per comment is likely much higher. But let’s just call it one comment for every 200 visitors for the sake of simplicity.
And the majority of those comments are from other real estate agents. Yes, sometimes real estate buyers and sellers comment. More often, they email or phone.
Comments rarely turn into clients.
This was my “number 11” that I added in the comments to the Active Rain post. And I’m sticking with it:
11. Don’t obsess over comment count. Realize the VAST majority of blog readers never leave a comment. Focus on calls to action that appeal to real estate buyers and sellers and get them to make contact in some way.
I’d trade 500 comments by other agents for 1 phone call, email, or home search registration by a potential home buyer or seller…
Any thoughts?
Photo Credit: lowjumpingfrog on Flickr. CC License.
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A post about commenting on blogs? Sounds like comment bait to me.
After almost 6 years of running a real estate blog I've found that the best "comments" aren't those that are written at the end of the post. The best comments are the long emails from complete strangers asking for more clarification or thanking you for the explanantion. The best comments are phone calls from "lurkers" hiring you to be their agent after becoming a fan of your blog.
A successful real estate blog is tied to a successful real estate business. It's not about the number of fans, AR points, or comments. It's about selling houses.
Any new blogger should thank you for the sage advice.
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Definitely worth reading it, very informative,
Regards, Prudent Real Estate
You know what, I have seen in my life that commenting some thing is really easy job. But it become very important on what topic you are commenting. If you have some thing really good to share that others can also have advantage out of it than that comment is some thing useful information to site visitors, which will give them some information,and when you are getting comment it seems that you work, or you think the way others are doing which is really helpful.
Comment's should always be informative keep that in mind. Because your comment can give others the new vision to face the world. Thank you
Hi, Geordie Romer is correct about the serious readers who really appreciate the info by emailing.
But those are like one in a million literally. 1 visitor in a million will find time to thank you personally. (and that doesnt attract readers if they don't know about it)
But having a lot of comments will show new visitors that a lot of people are following the blog which in turn attracts more visitors. I wouldn't have commented here if I didnt see the other comments. I would've just assumed that this blog was one of those millions of blogs that are never updated and the author stopped posting.
Bianca from Eton Properties
At the end of the day, what matters is the number of visits on your site by human beings.
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The title of this post is great. Several person visit this blog because of the title. Blog commenting is the best way to get some backlinks in your site or blog.
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This is a great post that begs for thoughtful comments. I started blogging in March and am still waiting for my first comment! My readership has increased and have received a couple of new clients from the site, but it's frustrating not to receive feedback from readers. You make a good point about having a goal for your site – thanks again for your post!
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I have seen in my life that commenting some thing is really easy job. But it become very important on what topic you are commenting. If you have some thing really good to share that others can also have advantage out of it than that comment is some thing useful information to site visitors, which will give them some information,and when you are getting comment it seems that you work, or you think the way others are doing which is really helpful.
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It depends on the content of the article if its interesting then I would probably leave a comment as a deep appriciation to the article and also the publisher itself.
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