The great thing about blogs, rather than books, is that they are interactive. These are amazing times we live in when we can comment and interact with other writers and bloggers too. Also “Blog Commenting” is considered Good Karma, and supportive of the fellow blogging community, if done properly.
In the spirit of “Sharing the Love”, there are three WordPress Plugins, that can make sharing easier for your readers and followers, and reward them for taking the time to comment. These are Commentluv, Disqus and IntenseDebate:
1. Commentluv
Once installed and activated on your site, this plugin will visit the site of the comment author while they type their comment and retrieve a selection of their last blog posts, tweets or digg submissions which they can choose one from to include at the bottom of their comment when they click submit.
This type of plugin benefits the commenters as it gives them a link back to their information, and it is good for the blogger since it should encourage more feedback.
Also since WordPress upgraded to allow “Threaded Comments”, this really eliminates the need for a fancy operating system.
As you can guess, I use Commentluv, and I also take extra effort to comment on other blogs I come across using this plugin. I think it’s really great.
Feel free to download the plugin HERE.
2. Disqus
The main competitor for Commentluv is Disqus. Disqus offers 2 services for bloggers. Disqus Comments and Disqus Profile. Disqus Comments is a comment system and moderation tool for your website. Disqus Profile lets you get the most out of the comments you post on other websites.
Even if you do not plan on using this plugin on your site, it’s a good idea to sign up for a Profile, so you can comment easily on the sites that do use it.
A lot of bloggers have been complaining across the web about Disqus, which is why I decided not to use it. Some of the complaints include – 1. ALL other comment related plugins cancelled out, including Akismet. 2. The comments and control remains on the Disqus server. 3. Commenter names tend to appear as “usernames” rather than full names.
Some positive comments I found, said that they liked the fact that it’s easy to sign into Disqus with Twitter or Facebook. If you really like Disqus…. I would appreciate a positive opinion below.
Feel free to download the plugin HERE.
3. Intense Debate
IntenseDebate’s comment system enhances and encourages conversation on your blog or website. Intense Debate has been compared more to Disqus, and there seems to be more fans of Intense Debate than Disqus. I believe Intense Debate was acquired by the owners of WordPress, which is why WordPress blog users find Intense Debate more friendly.
Similar to Disqus, you can have an ID Profile as well, which you can use to comment on other people’s blogs. The people who really like it, and the people who really dislike it seem to be split 50/50. One of the complaints is that there is little control over the style of the layout.
Feel free to download the plugin HERE.
Which Blog Commenting sytem do you use? Styling your WordPress Blog with a variety of plugins? Or upgrading to a system like Disqus of IntenseDebate?
Blog commenting has been one of the strategies used to promote one’s link. Others do article submission, other submit their sites on online business directory, and others do contextual links. The important thing now is to have the best tools used.
I was in doubt over using commentluv or disqus or livefyre. As you have done i think it’s best to have commentluv (with maybe facebook plugin) for comments. But you know the negetive factor always remains that some people will use it for spamming on websites for backlinks. Anyway you get the traffic. I think the inbuilt wordpress comment with Akismet is pretty good too. What do you think ?