We all know how important it is for us bloggers to communicate with our readers or visitors whenever they leave us a comment. Some bloggers respond to their commentators, and some, well, don’t. And those who respond to their commentators do it either by sending their commentators an email, or replying to their comments directly on their blogs.
But my friend, Owen, had recently developed a very useful plugin that enables bloggers to reply to a comment AND at the same time sends the commentator an exact copy of the comment! This brilliant plugin is called the Comment Email Responder, and can be downloaded for FREE from Owen’s site.
So what does the plugin do, exactly?
The purpose of the plugin is to provide an easy mechanism for a blog administrator to email a response to one of the comments placed on the website. The response becomes a comment in the normal way, but also fires off an email to the commentator with the content of the response and his original comment.
Install Comment Email Responder in 3 simple steps:
- Download the plugin, unzip the file and drop the contents into your plugin folder.
- Activate the plugin from your Plugins menu.
- Configure the plugin from your Options > Comment Email Responder menu.
How do I use the plugin?
Simple. Once the plugin has been activated, you will notice a new envelope icon appearing next to commentator’s name in your comments section (see picture below).
Click on the envelope icon to respond to the comment. You will see a “Replying to” line below your comment box (see picture below) which indicates the comment that you are currently responding to.
When you click SUBMIT COMMENT, a copy of your response will be emailed to the particular commentator.
Brilliant, isn’t it? :D
So if you’d like to give the plugin a try and see how much time you’ll be able to save from replying to comments, hop on over to official plugin site NOW!
What does the reply look like on the blog? Is it another comment from the blog owner or a reply directly on the commentor’s comment?
Giddy Tiger: This is how it will look like — a comment from the blog owner (that’s me) replied to your comment, and you will also receive this exact message in your mailbox :)
As, I see….so it appears as a new comment in your post, as opposed to an edited comment. Thanks for showing me!
Ooooo….that is a nice idea. :) Shall give it a go. :D Thankies!!
Isn’t that the same as “notify me of follow-up comments via e-mail” plugin?
I hate that, when the blogger tick it as default as if that posts have like 100 comments, I will be spammed 100 times.
Jason: The difference is that the commentator only gets a reply is the blog owner clicks on the “envelope icon” next to his/her name. For example, if I clicked on Yvy’s name to reply to her, the comment will appear here on my blog, and in Yvy’s email, but all other commentators won’t receive it, see? :)