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A quick post today as I'm still playing catchup after my holiday – but I couldn't wait to tell you about the My Comment Authors Plugin developed by blogger Enstine Muki, whose informative posts have been adding no end of information to my blogging knowledge. (And he's a thoroughly nice guy too!)
This is a free WordPress plugin that you can download and install on your blog in the normal way, and then you can customise it under “Settings” in your WordPress dashboard.
What is the purpose of My Comment Authors?
This is such a clever idea. What it does is very special for those of us who understand the importance of building a blogging community. Here are the highlights from the WordPress.org plugin directory:
- Generates a list of your comment authors for a chosen month of the year.
- Then creates a blog post to thank them for commenting on your blog.
- Emails them (optionally) to thank them, which encourages them back to your blog.
- For those who are more active, you may choose to give them a dofollow link on the list by setting a certain number.
How many times have you found an interesting blog, left a comment, intended to come back for more posts, but forgotten? Sorry, I do it all the time, it's so easy to do!
When I received Enstine's email thanking me for my comments I returned to his blog, and in turn that reminded me of several other interesting bloggers whose posts I had read. I have since re-visited their blogs too, and had the benefit of their comments on my posts in return. Yes, it IS time-consuming, but I'm afraid there's just no shortcut to learning and building a sustainable business online.
Don't Download My Comment Authors Until…
… you have read Enstine's blog post about it. I haven't done it justice in the brief notes above!
My Comment Authors version 1 from Enstine Muki – Read this first
And – I can't keep up with him – he's responded super-quick to feedback from other bloggers and come up with even more features in version 1.2 (at the time of writing, but knowing Enstine goodness knows how many enhancements there may be by the time you read this).
Version 1.2 from Enstine Muki – Read this second 🙂 LOTS more features added
I can't wait for the end of the month to try it out. So to see how it works and be on my list of commentators (and Enstine's) please be sure to leave a comment on my blog and on his. I've already set up a reminder on my calendar.
Couple of Asides
As a computer programmer myself, I was really interested in the insights I gained into what goes into writing WordPress plugins. It's certainly not something I plan to do myself, but it was interesting.
Second aside (sorry) if you're not sure of the value of comments, well – neither was I. Until a fairly nondescript (but controversial) post on one of my health blogs found its way onto page 1 of Google because it had attracted a bunch of comments from people who either agreed or disagreed with my opinion! I hadn't promoted that post at all. Google obviously just liked the fact that real people were making relevant comments.
What Now?
So – please drop me a comment below to let me know you are getting your copy of the My Comment Authors plugin, then grab the plugin, thank Enstine on his blog (he deserves it) and USE it!!
