A Stinging Comment is Better Than No Comments At All

by Costa on December 8, 2007

I have had posts that solicits comments. I too have posts that somehow repels comments. Either way, I take things in stride as long as my blog statistics shows that I am not losing readers just because the comments show zero. No doubt, comments, lots of them, gives every blogger the encouragement to do better. Comments means our article have been read through and they have found something to discuss over or to criticize over. Feedback from these comments whether they are good or critical provides us a platform to work on the improvement of our blog and blogging skills as a whole.

I have learned a lot of things from the comments I get. The last time Vic of BloggingZoom came and commented that I took the lazy way out when submitting my articles to social networks made me realized that the proper way to describe my article when I submit is to write a proper comprehension instead of copying and pasting part of the article in the submission. This will maximise the benefit of the submitted posts even if no one clicks on that submission.

We have to accept he fact that we cannot filter our readers to only readers that have the same opinion as us. If that was possible and everyone who turns up gives us positive comments, we will live in an imaginary world above cloud nine. The kind of people reading our blogs are so wide and varied. Some are very accommodating. Some, very forgiving and nice. Then there are some who are perfectionist who can’t even accept a simple spelling mistake and some who can’t accept the layout of your blog. I benefit the most from the critical ones.

For one, I don’t think I will ever misspell the word “loosing” ever again with two “o”s. when I mean it to be “to lose” and not the opposite of “too tight” LOL. Problem was, it was not a “spelling” mistake so my spell checker failed to detect the “mistake”

Then today, I learned another lesson. Not to use i-stock photos with the water marks on them. It looks really unprofessional to some, especially to those who are into web designs or fields of the same nature. To a casual blogger, I don’t think these nitty gritty things crosses our minds when we sees them or even when we posts our articles.

These are the small things we learn as we go along. The gist is, we must learn from the criticisms we get rather than get all riled up when someone makes a negative comment. Some goes to the extent of chasing away their critics with very harsh words, telling them to f#@k off and they are not welcomed to their blogs. Being so self centered will only make them stagnant and being thus, they will never improve.

Related posts:

  1. An Ecthical Way To Comment Spam? Lately, I have been getting quite a number of comments that are relevant, yet not relevant and Akismet let them pass through as legitimate comments. If it sounds confusing I’m sorry. I mean relevant in the sense that the comments don’t seemed to be from an automated software but was...
  2. It Is Not Absolutely Necessary To Reply Comments. While it is the standard advise by all gurus and guru wannabe who steals this advise from the real gurus, that it is good blogging practise to reply to all your comments, I think this advise have been somewhat misunderstood by all those who have just started to make a...
  3. How To Keep Blogging Without Getting Comments Some guy asked me, “how do you manage to keep blogging every other day when most of your posts gets no comments?” Frankly, I’ve never thought of that or even asked myself that question. Yea.. how the hell do I manage to find the inspiration to blog here day...
  4. The Other Factor In Blog Comments I wrote that commenting in blogs as a means to build traffic is an outdated tip. I still thinks so. If we are to build up our blog with this method, we are going to take years and regularly commenting in a few thousand blogs so a few thousand bloggers...
  5. Renew Comments on Blogs Forgotten I am seriously behind now. Darren pop out another 3 tips while I was busy with other things so it looks like my target of meeting the problogger’s 31 blogging tips project with 31 of my own won’t be attainable when the whole thing ends. I am really amazed at...

{ 7 comments }

Saedel December 8, 2007 at 10:39 am

Good for you. ;)

As for me, I haven’t received negative comments yet, but I had received sarcastic and comedic ones.

I approved those. At the end of the day, it’s just a comment of one person who “visited”, and loyal readers sometimes know that. I don’t feed the troll so as not to make a big deal out of it.

Trolls come and go. When someone gives a negative (but constructive) comments, the first logical things to do is to consider the source. Is that person credible? Does he really know what he’s talking about?

Leaving those comments in your blog is okay, as some readers might join the discussion and learn from each other. And like you said, better to learn from them than deflect them.

Good post. *thumbs-up*

Costa December 8, 2007 at 12:11 pm

Saedel

The first thing I do is always ask myself if I am guilty as charged. If I am guilty, then the feeling won’t be too hurtful.

Thanks for the thumbs up. :-)

Juggling.jason December 9, 2007 at 1:38 am

I absolutely agree. I for one love feedback of the critical nature. How, precisely, one can encourage that I’m not sure. Perhaps that could be the subject of a future article?

Chanya December 9, 2007 at 3:46 am

Saedel:

I totally agree with what you’re saying. You’ve made some good points in this post. I just zoomed it and stumbled it.

Costa December 9, 2007 at 7:57 am

Juggling Jason

Hmm.. you have given me some fruit for thought. I will have to ponder over that. Thanks!

Chanya
Thanks for another thumbs up!

helen December 10, 2007 at 12:45 pm

Yes, I think bloggers should not be afraid of critics. There’s much to learn from criticism when it’s directed at the points. Of course baseless troll comments that is meant to just degrade should be ignored.:-)

jeferrer January 19, 2008 at 7:29 am

Hi! I was dropping by your blog and read at least 3 articles already…nice blog!

I believe a blogger should really not be paranoid of comments. Comments provide the medium for communication and interactivity…which are, i think, the main purpose of blogs in the first place.

Cheers!

Comments on this entry are closed.