Improve comments & conversations on business blogs

The goals and intent of each business blog are unique to each business. It is vital to define and keep true to those goals, in order to assess the success of a blog or web property. For some businesses, the intent of a blog is to build a following with new visitors as potential customers, and the blog posts act as additional entrance points to the brand website. Other businesses may use their blog to increase loyalty with existing clients, and the blog articles reference resources, tips and useful information. These are just a few possibilities with business blogs.

Commenting for business blogs

The rules for any community manager include participation in the community. This is especially true for one's own blog, business or brand blog. Making a blog more interactive, can help further business goals for a blog or web property.

Tips for improving commenting

• Invite comments - First of all, if you really want your visitors to comment, then ask them to do so. Sometimes the simplest answer is the best starting point. 
• Respond to comments - You must be willing to follow suit with commenting. If you don't respond to comments, then your community will not mature and your users will not feel like they are heard.
• Open up the conversation - Your content must leave room for other's opinions or reactions. Try experimenting with questions, open-ended statements or a conversational tone.
• Humility can help - Expressing a sense or tone of humility or humbleness can elicit empathy or openness with visitors. It can also help others feel more comfortable with your blog and community.
• Reward comments - If you occasion reference or highlight comments from visitors, it can act as a reward system to attract more of the same.
• Guide & monitor quality - Establish boundaries within commenting community to improve the quality of future comments. This can be done with your response to past comments, and also it occurs through your comment approval process. People will see the kind and style of existing comments, which will serve as a model for future comments within your business blog.
• Do not allow SPAM - Spam can hurt your site and limit the quality of comments you receive. You must fight SPAM and delete all spam from your posts.

It is always important to focus on the goals and intent of your blog--as a blog can serve many purposes for a business--but it's purpose must be distinct. You can use a blog for marketing, which will define the goals, content, tone and frequency. Whereas if your blog is an add-on to your product offering (meaning if it is supplemental to your product), then this intent will define it's content and tone.