Why Even Your BEST Posts Don’t Get Many Comments
Have you ever experienced this? I have experienced this few times and that’s the reason I’m bringing this topic today. I have made few good posts (at least GOOD in my point of view) in my blog and sometimes I receive almost ZERO comments to them. I really hate to see ‘0 Comments’ showing in my blog posts. But it happens to every blogger. You may have expected the post to do well and you would have expected it to receive more than 50 comments but you would have got disappointed by seeing a number less than 15. Sometimes you even have ‘0 comments’ in the post. Without any further ado, let me tell you the main reasons why your blog post doesn’t receive the expected number of comments.
Comment Form Not Working
This might sound very silly but it is actually a mistake which you do without knowing. When you update to the latest WordPress version or when you change theme, you might forget to update the comment form. I, once, had this problem in my blog. I didn’t know there was a problem. I was really surprised to see ‘0 comments’ for continuously two posts which I thought would get around 10-20 comments. I, then, got an email from one of my commentators that my comment form is not working. When I checked it, there was a mistake in the comment form and I solved the problem quickly. The successive blog posts received much more comments than what I expected. So don’t forget to check the comment form now and then.
Image Source: buggolo
Too Many Ads
You have too many ads in your blog post and this makes me to leave your blog without trying to comment in it. I posted about the things which you should not do when advertising in blogs. Don’t throw ads on your visitors’ face. They came to read your post and not your ads, isn’t it? To tell the truth, if you ask me whether I have ever placed many ads in my blog, then I will nod my head and say ‘YES’. When I started blogging (nearly 8 months back), I used to place many ads. I never used to get more than 4 comments even for the good posts. But I stopped doing it in nearly 2 weeks when I found that placing too many ads is a mistake. It’s not late and you can always remove those ads. So if you are one of those people who unknowingly place too many ads, then go to your blog and remove some of the ads and you will surely (99%) see increase in comments you receive.
Again, it’s not your mistake. Maybe a little misconception made you to place many ads in the blog. If the comments form is not working, you are not to be blamed. After all you didn’t know that happened. So I suggest you to go and check your comments form if it’s working and also check if you have too many ads. Look at your blog from a visitor’s view and you will know whether they would like to comment in your blog or not.
Michael Martine | January 19th, 2008 at 11:36 am #
Great post, Ramkarthik. Another reason why you don’t have any comments is that you didn’t leave an opening for anyone to add anything else (which you have nicely done on this post
).
Mark Dykeman | January 19th, 2008 at 2:01 pm #
Ramkarthik (and Michael), good points on why one might not be getting comments on your best blog posts.
However, I think it’s possible to write a wonderful blog post that just doesn’t lend itself to comments because there’s no invitation to the reader to comment or no call to action. You can still write a great post without including those last two points.
Ramkarthik | January 19th, 2008 at 8:40 pm #
Michael, You’re right. Sometimes people don’t have anything to add to the post because the author has written everything. I have few times received comments like “You covered all the points and you have left nothing for me tell”. I would think “Oh did I cover all of them? Really, did I?”
But anyway good point.
Mark, I agree with you on the point of inviting your reader to comment and also make him feel like home so that he will comment.
Online Community Building | January 20th, 2008 at 7:46 am #
Many blogs I come across have articles with a low number of comments, and after a little investigation I find they have the link for the comments form at the beginning of an article rather than at the end. This is such a silly mistake to make - the comment link should always be at the end of an article rather than at the beginning; why would anyone want to comment before they read a post?
- Martin Reed
Stylish Girl | January 20th, 2008 at 6:38 pm #
Too many ads
too few ads 
looks hard . I’m wonder … I have too many ?
Chris Vincent | January 21st, 2008 at 12:55 am #
Sometimes i don’t post on popular websites because i don’t usually get any people coming back to my own blog, but this doesn’t apply to my favourite blogs.
Judge | January 23rd, 2008 at 6:12 pm #
Thanks for this post. I had to take a hard look at my site and decided that a lot of the ads (and stuff that looked like ads) had to be cleaned up.
Since I am the only one who even remotely cares what my blog is worth, I pulled that widget. I removed one of the google adsense ads (since they arent making money for me anyway) and also removed the image that showed our support for the WGA. (we still support them, but I didnt feel the need to keep the image on the site if they werent paying me).
Negative space is key and its too easy to go overboard with widgets and ads.
Thanks for the boot to the head.
Vanessa | May 9th, 2008 at 5:23 pm #
I’ve been to a lot of sites over the years and seen many sites with so much advertising you had to find the post. In fact some of the top 100 blogs (according to Technorati) are good examples.
But I also notice people comment anyway if the site is popular and has a lot of links and traffic—I wonder why? I don’t think ads have much to do with it. People will comment if they want to or not. But it is nice when visitors let you know there is something technically wrong with your comment box and they are unable to comment.
I do agree some of us have been sidebar addicts and our sites need cleaning up every now and then. Nice post!