Making the most of off-site discussions

Photo by ktylecronk

If you’ve had a blog for a while, you may have noticed a shift in the last year or two in the way people interact with it. Comment threads were once the main measure of engagement with blogs, but now when you share your links on Twitter, Facebook and other social sites, readers will often discuss posts in the space where they found the link, rather than on the linked blog.

The positive side of this phenomenon is that it means you’re finding the readers where they are, and giving them what they want, where they want it. It also means that you have meaningful connections with people in those other spaces, and they think it’s worth jumping in on discussions.

But those discussions can contain some really valuable interactions, insightful comments, and challenging points of view. Ideally you don’t want to leave all that good stuff behind on some other site that’s not yours, to be absorbed into the ether and forgotten. Furthermore, participants on one site might not see the comments from another site, which means they could miss the best part!

What to do? I suggest a discussion recap post. You re-state your original question, summarize the overall themes of the discussion, and highlight the best comments. (And by best, I mean the ones that added the most to the discussion, not just the ones you agreed with.) It’s a great way to preserve the discussion, offer follow-up and recognition to your most loyal readers– and you get a whole extra blog post out of it, that you can link to all over again.

Just be sure to ask permission to re-post comments from sites like Facebook, where users may have different expectations of privacy. Asking first is polite & up-front. The aim here is to make people feel appreciated, not overexposed.

Here’s an example of the discussion re-cap post in action:

1. I wrote this post, where I questioned a thought-provoking statement in a recent review of Rhythm and Blues.
2. I shared the post on Twitter, my Facebook author page, and my Facebook Profile.
3. The topic heated up right away, especially on Facebook. Turns out the concept of “alternative lifestyles” and teens is a hot button issue for many people.
4. I made sure to participate actively in each discussion thread, so people would know they’d been heard, and that I valued their input.
5. I created a post that highlighted comments from all those discussions.
6. I shared my new post in all the usual places, all over again. The discussion continued, on and offline.

One parting thought: there is no stats package that will calculate the value of people telling you on the street or at parties that they liked something on your blog, but I guarantee if that happens, you’re doing something right. Just like quality comments are more important than the overall number of comments you receive, where discussions occur is secondary to the fact that they are happening.