Bloggy Basics: Guest Post: Blog Commenting 101

I am so excited to have a guest poster for Bloggy Basics today!  I saw this post on Donna's blog and loved how she broke down the very basics of commenting in Blogger in a way that non bloggers can really understand!  I asked her to post here.  She agreed as long as I added in information about my Intense Debate comment system!  A full tutorial is coming soon!

Donna Perugini is a Children’s Author of 4 books, now available through Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble, and Christian bookstores. 

Her Author Website (when finally online) is www.DonnaPerugini.com  for purchases, book trailers and FREE coloring pages 

Check out her blog:  http://www.donnaperuginichildrensauthor.com/  for FREE coloring pages of the book’s characters, Subscribe by Email and leave a comment on any posting for FREE music with book illustrations DVD to download of The Flight of Orville Wright Caterpillar,and watch all 4 book trailers. 

Donna lives in the Pacific NW, Washington State , and is a loving, appreciative wife, mother of three and grandmother of four.  She is also a Women’s Ministry Speaker and a Potter/Sculptor, entering juried shows with her ceramics. 

My Books will be ready October 2010!  The Author
Website will be http://www.donnaperugini.com/
Subscribe to my blog by email to be informed!!

 This is for all my Facebook friends who wonder

• what a blog is,
• how do I read it,
• what do you mean subscribe by email,
• why isn't my comment being accepted after hitting the accept button at least 3 times, and
• why are you frustrating me this way? 

A BLOG is simply my way to give you useful information as parents and grandparents, stories, book reviews and interviews with interesting people (who you might even know).

READING A BLOG can be done a few ways.  You might have found it 'partially' on Facebook.  If you click the 'like' or 'thumbs up' or 'comment', it will appear on your Facebook wall.  To really get to my blog, you will need to click the title of the Posting on my Facebook wall.  This takes you to my blog where at the top of my blog you will see a header with tabs underneath.  These tabs offer you great opportunities to get FREE coloring pages, look inside the books, see book trailers (simply a partial video of the book being read with illustrations), my ceramics website (I'm also a potter/sculptor and do pottery with the book's characters on them).

SUBSCRIBE BY EMAIL means my postings will always show up in your personal email box. The email address you leave is never revealed to anyone else...just me. I'll use it to send announcements of new books, giveaways and freebies.  Soon I'll have a musical DVD link available for each book for FREE when you subscribe by email to my blog.  It's a simple step to take and get songs that were specifically written for each book. If you subscribe by email before the musical DVD URL is posted, I'll simply look at my email list you subscribed on and send you the URL.  Please subscribe by email to my blog postings.

COMMENTS can be left by clicking at the top of the posting where it shows the words, "Intelligent Thoughts".  The number of comments appears before the words, "Intelligent Thoughts".  This takes you to the place where you'll post that intelligent opinion.  After posting, you'll see that you need to sign in under one of these headings (if you belong to any of them).....Google, TypePad, WordPress, Live Journal, AIM, Open ID, Name/Url, Anonymous.Okay, so you don't recognize what to do next?  More than likely you are not someone who has a blog. 

So this is what you do....you click Anonymous.

If you click on Anonymous, please let me know who you are in the body of your comment by leaving a way to reach you.  You may be anonymous to the blogging world, but I don't want you to remain anonymous to me!  I REALLY ENJOY HEARING FROM MY READERS.  As a matter of fact, your comments count a lot to a Literary Agent or a Publisher looking at my blog and interaction with my readers through 'intelligent thoughts' on my blog.  They believe if you like me enough to leave your thoughts, then they see possibility in acquiring me as one of their authors.

FRUSTRATION IN COMMENTING is common for Blogspot (where my blog is hosted).  I took off the 'spam checker' that made my readers jump through hoops when they wanted to leave a comment(spam checker makes you spell out the word you see) because of that frustration.  My own sister said, "When you get with your Peeps and straighten this out, I'll leave a comment".

Don't Leave the Comment Page After Clicking Once

This is what will happen to you when you click the "Post Comment" button....it will look like it worked, but then you'll need to click it again.  Then it will look like you were successful but you need to check and see if it posted on the blog.  If it did not post, click it one more time.  I know, you'd think the people who make the software for Blogger would have this one covered, but until then, that's the format.  Keep clicking until you see it took you comments.  You know it took them by looking to see if it posted on the blog like you see the others posted.

I Learned The Hard Way!!

One piece of advice from someone who learned the hard way:  Copy your comments until you know for sure that everything went okay.  If your commenting was deleted by leaving the page somehow or you left after the first click, then you'll at least have what you copied to put it in and try again (don't quit!)  I figured that one out by losing too many comments...and some were brilliant! 

When you are at the Post Comment button, look to your right and you'll see another Subscribe by Email button.  You'll even see the Subscribe by Email link in the body of this posting.  And another place to find it is in the top right corner of this blog page where it says Subscribe by Email. 

You want to get FREE updates by email or RSS.

**********************

Thank you Donna!  Now, a little bit about alternative comment systems.

Q - Why?
A - I chose to use one so I could INTERACT through comments. Readers can respond directly to comments through a reply feature. If a reader opts to leave an email address, I can respond directly to them. It's great to build a community.  I can even reply to comments directly from my email!

Q - What's out there?
A - The two main systems are Intense Debate and Disqus.  Both offer very similar features.  Both help prevent spam. Both allow replies. Both allow for leaving email addresses (which are never published).  I chose Intense Debate because of CommentLuv. Readers who blog can leave their blog address and  show others what their latest post was - a great way to help promote other blogs.

Q - Is it hard to set up?
A - I had a few hiccups installing Intense Debate, but after a few tries, I got it right. I installed it on my now-ended PennyPinchingPenguin blog and did it lickety split.  I'll walk you through the steps so you don't have the same issues I did.  I just about installed Disqus.  It seemed to be a very simple install as well.

Here is a post I wrote explaining how to use the system right after I installed it.  Hopefully it will shed some light on the systems.  Next week I will teach you HOW to install Intense Debate!




For past Bloggy Basics, make sure to check the "For Blogs" tab at the top!