It’s very reassuring to see high-profile bloggers responding and showing readers some respect and appreciation. I suppose it’s the same as remembering one’s roots.

I think I’m with you on responding to a lot of comments. I try to write in bulk (depending on the post) after some time has passed. I then only respond to the readers that have called on me directly, or ones that need assistance, as Jeff pointed out.

Now, if I were to get hundreds of daily comments on my blog, I too would most probably not have much time left for responding to each comment as I do now, but I would definitely at least thank everyone for input and comment to some of them, especially the ones with questions, interesting opinions and valuable input.

I know several blogs that get several dozens of comments and the authors do an amazing job by replying to most of them. I feel genuinely welcomed on such blogs. That proves that even high profiled bloggers who receive lots of comments don’t have any excuse in not replying to them. After all, most of them are full-time bloggers, so if blogging is their job and they can find time for regular posting, they can and should find time for interacting and responding to their readers, at least to some.

As for breaking the conversation, I find waiting some time for readers to leave their comments/thoughts and then writing a bulk reply in one comment and covering all or some of those comments works really well – it still allows for the conversation to flow in addition to the two-way response.

Yes. Conversation terminated! Oh, I can see the Terminator quotes coming on.

You bring up an interesting point, something I’ve thought about in a previous post. The thought being, are there only certain type of blogs where author/reader interaction is ideal…

I’d hope that all blogs/sites were capable of a conversational atmosphere, but perhaps not. I’ll have to think on this some more.

A lot of smaller blogs “get” this, but quite a few – notably larger blogs – don’t. And I rarely return to those. I think the only blogs that can get away with no author interaction are the bigger media blogs, where the conversation is kept entirely alive by commenters. But to be honest I only rarely comment on those (only if I feel very strongly about the topic or believe I really have something worth contributing to the conversation), primarily because I rarely feel the need to give feedback to anyone other than a post author.

Thank you for your insight as always.

Yes, too many “I agrees” and “thanks” would definitely kill it. I suppose in those instances, the author should interact when directly engaged or when a reader asks a question or is confused by something.

I suppose my technique is to thank everyone for their feedback, and then address those who have requested feedback from me directly or indirectly.

Here’s a follow-up question if you’re in the mood .. if you know an author won’t respond, would you still leave a comment? And if so, why?

If I were to answer it, I would say: it depends on the blog’s environment. If the blog is built up around the community and I think my comment would help them out, I would leave a comment, regardless of the interaction with the author. I would also leave a comment to demonstrate expertise.

If a blog is built upon an author and his or her work, and the author is a no-show, I suppose then I wouldn’t care to leave a comment.

In fact, I think responding to every single on in some instances breaks up the conversation. In the same way that pingbacks interrupt the conversational flow, having the post author interrupt a good discussion by thanking each individual for their input can kill things.

e.g. to take Chris Garrett’s post: I don’t think he needed to respond to each single one of us who said “yeah, I upgraded the second Matt said I could”. A blanket “it seems our readers are really on the ball” or similar comment would have covered that. But your comment (about themes not breaking) *did* need an individual response, and that would have moved the conversation onwards.

e.g. #2 on your upgrading post: I don’t think you would need to say “well that’s good news” to everyone who said it went without a hitch. Picking up on specific problems, or recommendations is good: asking if people blogged about their issues is good. Both of those, you already did.

Any thoughts on how to respond to comments when you get a truckload?