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Commenting is on other people’s blog is fun, and it’s great when people comment on your blog too. It turns out that many WordPress themes provide a permalink allowing you to link directly to a comment.
This is really cool. It’s so cool, I even wrote Practical WordPress Tip #19.
The upshot: continue your discussions forward by backlinking to existing comments.
Each theme and commenting system has a slightly different method for presenting the permalink to each comment. Some themes, unfortunately, don’t have this capability. Here’s how comment permalinks work in a few themes and commenting systems you may be familiar with.
1. Three Column Red theme
- Link: Hitting that blog income heavy.
- Screenshot:
2. Disqus-based blogs
- Link: To comment or not to comment.
- Screenshot:
3. Atahualpa theme
- Link: Make some money.
- Screenshot:
4. Thesis Theme
- Link: An Existential Crisis.
- Screenshot:
5. Intense Debate system
- Link: Extortion? My goodness!.
- Screenshot:
6. Kelly Diel’s Custom Theme
- Link: Girl Power rulez.
- Screenshot:
- Submitted by Violet Minded (who also coded Kelly’s theme).
7. Theme name
It’s not hard, give it a shot.
8. Theme name
Think about it: your link and screenshot right here.
9. Theme name
Backlinks are cool, really.
10. Theme name
It’s ok to be last.
Who’s in?
Let’s have 5 4 more from readers, match the above with
- Theme name.
- Link to appropriate comment. Be creative!
- Screenshot showing how the link to that comment is presented.
Great post, Dave. I was working on linking to comments for Cleavage and devised a way to provide permalinks for all comments, nested or no.
Theme: Cleavage
Link
Screenshot
Sorry about the dual comment!
.-= Amanda´s last blog ..Embracing emptiness, silence, and darkness. =-.
Linked. Thanks!
Hey cool, Dave! I never thought about linking to a comment to continue a discussion, as you suggested. I use the Thesis theme, and I never would have figured it out, so thank you.
I wonder if others can get link juice if I link to my or another person’s comment on their blog? Hmm…
.-= Heather Kephart´s last blog ..Fiction or Bust =-.
Good question.
Search engines change how algorithms at will so I don’t worry so much about the link juice.
I see comment linking as a relationship builder.
And here’s the cool thing: search engines *really* hard to figure out these real relationships. In a sense, what we’re doing may be ahead of the search engine game. I don’t know whether it “hurts” or not, but I don’t really care.
.-= Dr WordPress!´s last blog ..Pre-Writing Is Your Friend – With Benefits (Part 1) =-.
I agree! I never really understood about link juice, anyway. But I hear about it all the time.
Take care.
.-= Heather Kephart´s last blog ..Fiction or Bust =-.
Heather, if your web pages make lot of people happy for a long time, you don’t need to worry about link juice. It will find you.
.-= Dr WordPress!´s last blog ..Your First AWeber Autoresponder Followup Series =-.
I hope so! And by the way, please do note that I was hoping to bring link juice to the websites whose comments I linked to on my own blog, not to procure link juice for myself. I prefer a Patron Cadillac Margarita. :)
.-= Heather Kephart´s last blog ..Fiction or Bust =-.
JL had to postpone our plans till tomorrow, so it looks like I’ve got a work night ahead of me. I’ve got a few things to tackle on the comment side of my site, I might as well make this one of those things.
.-= Deacon´s last blog ..101 things I learned from making 101 prints, Part 3 =-.
Make those backups before getting started.
I have a couple of ideas that I think could increase your conversion rate, we should talk at some point.
.-= Dr WordPress!´s last blog ..Pre-Writing Is Your Friend – With Benefits (Part 2) =-.
I know I have some overhauls to make.
I’m listening…
.-= Deacon´s last blog ..101 things I learned from making 101 prints, Part 4 =-.
What’s the point of a direct link to the comments? Isn’t the content of your post what matters not the comments themselves. What is the benefit?
.-= Rancho Murieta´s last blog ..Should Summerfest Continue at Stonehouse? =-.
@RM – Linking to comments allows you to continue the discussion.
Like linking to individual tweets.
If you’re looking for magic google link juice, this is the wrong place. If you want bring readers into ongoing conversations, you just made bank.
Hint: Everything all search engines do is attempting as hard as the can, with algorithms, to find real people on the web. Because that’s where the value is.
.-= Dr WordPress!´s last blog ..Romance & Misery, Your Blog is Calling (It’s that dang Week in Review) =-.
Hey, Dave… I actually noticed this technique since I started reading your articles, and I can say that it’s effective. One thing I was wondering though- commentluv is not updating my latest posts. But I’m going into it, maybe I can fix this problem in the next few minutes.
.-= Cebu Tech Blogger´s last blog ..Microsoft Office 2010 RC Torrent Download =-.
Bert, there’s lots of cool stuff you can do with hypertext. Read back through some of my articles for hints and tips.
.-= Dr WordPress!´s last blog ..Pre-Writing Is Your Friend – With Benefits (Part 2) =-.
I’m done with the commentluv mess… Now it’s updating already… thanks
.-= Cebu Tech Blogger´s last blog ..The Conscious Me Pre-Writing Challenge =-.
So it turns out my theme already had permalinks to individual comments. Whocoodanode?
I spent last night overhauling comments anyway, making some subtle tweaks to the code and style sheet.
Theme: Bad Deacon Design Custom
Link: Are we not men?
Screenshot here
.-= Deacon´s last blog ..101 things I learned from making 101 prints, Part 4 =-.
OK…. here goes
Theme: three column red
Link: Red Mittens
Screenshot:
not sure about how any of this will show up … have a feeling that the screenshot may not be right.
living dangerously … pressing “submit”
.-= Valentina´s last blog ..The Mitts That Were Seen Around the World! =-.
just as I thought! No screenshot!
50% not a passing grade.
How do I get that screenshot to appear here?
.-= Valentina´s last blog ..The Mitts That Were Seen Around the World! =-.