Creating a perfect response. What to reply to a post comment.

Reactions and comments are like tools or drivers that help the audience of posts on social media become engaging. As people engage with a post or content by sending in their comments and reactions, maybe by liking the post, the content creator will then examine and know if the content is valuable to his audience.

In this post, we'll look at the relevance of post comments and how to craft appropriate responses to these contents or posts. The first thing to note is this, every post whether a picture, video, article or blog communicates an idea or information targeted towards a particular people known as the audience in communication. 

In the communication channel, a sender is able to tell if his information has served its purpose rightly only when there is feedback.

The communication channel

A communication channel showing the five basic processes involved

This communication diagram means,

Sender: Someone who has a piece of information that is to be transferred or relayed.

Message: The information or communication content to be transferred.

Channel: Also known as the medium is what actually transfers the message from the sender to the receiver. In terms of communication in this digital age and particularly on social media, the channel is the media handle available for message transmission.

Receiver: This is the target of the message. The one to whom the communication content is tailored.

Feedback: This is the response from a receiver after being able to understand what the sender has sent to him.

The sender encodes the message by considering different factors like knowledge of his audience. For example, the literacy level of the audience, location, preferences and a whole lot. With this knowledge, the sender refines and presents his message in a way that is easily understood by the receiver. It is this process that is known as encoding a message. The process of encoding a message describes how a sender crafts a message such that the target audience can understand the message.

The receiver when he receives a message, tries to understand the message by reading carefully if it is a text, watching and listening to the message well enough to comprehend the message being carried. This is also the process of decoding.

How should a comment be received?

Any comment on a post on social media or the internet should be received with cheerfulness on the part of the creator. Therefore whether the comment speaks positively or negatively, there need not be any backlash between the creator and the reader who comments. To build a good relationship with the online community as a content creator, respect for everyone's view about the content is important. Considering a case of a counter reply or response from the creator to a reader whose comments may be negative, that person can be driven away. "It is easier to maintain returning customers than acquire new ones". Anyone who creates posts on any media platform for online consumption must therefore consider the readers or viewers as customers and try relating with them as such. 

Personal Experience

As a communication designer who creates content of all kinds be it videos, social media posts, blogs and the like, it is always a good thing for me when my viewers leave a reply on my posts. I worry when my content does not receive any comments or enough comments because measuring the usefulness of the content to users or consumers becomes difficult since I may only use viewer metrics. Comments actually help me know what the viewers think about the post, what is good about it and what improvements need to be made.

In fact, a content of mine on YouTube had a comment that got me thinking and wondering. This is it 'Make a video after 2 years please'

Well, it was hard accepting at first but I gave this reply after pondering over what the reply was meant to tell me.

Reply: Please, why did you say so?

Response: Xorlavideosa  (the channel), needs more practice, that's why.

Customers have the right to say what they think is best to do and intolerance to their comments will mean lack of readiness to improve and provide them with better offerings that will make them happy.

Why bother about comments and replies on posts?

As said earlier, every post is targeted towards a particular audience and if the product is successful in serving its purpose or not, the audience will have to say it in a comment or action for the content creator to know what the impact was.