Discover who likes your posts
Months ago we added the ability for readers to like your posts, and ever since thousands of people have been liking posts every day. But something was missing: there was no way for post authors to discover when someone liked something they’d written. Or even when someone new subscribed to the entire blog.
Today, these problems have been solved: We’ve added two new email notifications, one for likes and one for subscriptions.
Post authors will receive an email notification from WordPress.com, telling them which post was liked and who it was. And blog owners will receive an email when someone new subscribes to their blog. This gives instant feedback every time your post or blog gets some positive attention.
If email notifications are not for you, no problem. You can turn these notifications off by going to Dashboard→Settings→Discussion and deactivating the appropriate checkbox under “Email me whenever”.
And if you have a particularly active blog, we decided to leave some features off by default so you wouldn’t be annoyed. You can turn them on if you wish as described above. More details can be found in the support page for email notifications.
Posted: Tuesday, November 23rd, 2010 at 8:35 pm. Filed in Social, WordPress.com.
Tags: Features, likes, subscriptions
Nov 23rd at 8:42 pm
Great actually! I like that
Nov 23rd at 8:43 pm
Thank you! This is definitely something we needed. Just last week I found out I had a number of subscribers I didn’t even know about!
Nov 23rd at 8:46 pm
Brilliant idea! You guys are really making this blogging site the best there is!
Nov 23rd at 8:55 pm
Brilliant. Now I don’t need to check periodically.
Nov 23rd at 8:57 pm
But what if nobody likes my posts? :-{ Will I get an email saying nobody likes me?
Nov 23rd at 9:03 pm
Dan: have no fear – we like you and your posts.
Nov 23rd at 9:01 pm
Oh do I like this new feature. Thanks for your hard work.
Nov 23rd at 9:01 pm
I like that “like” is now far more likable!
Nov 23rd at 9:02 pm
That’s really good, even if I already receive hundreds of emails every day, I appreciate to get notified for this kind of good news! Thank you WordPress.com Team
Nov 23rd at 9:02 pm
This is brilliant! Thank you for adding this and for the most excellent blogging software tools and ease of use.
Nov 23rd at 9:03 pm
e-mail spam
Nov 23rd at 9:04 pm
What a great idea!!
Not being a techie I have been wondering how I discovered who had subscribed to my blog etc
PigletinPortugal
Nov 23rd at 9:04 pm
When is WordPress going to add a feature that allows bloggers to give/send people a link that allows people to click and subscribe to a blog? So far people have to go to the specific site and that can deter people from signing up easily.
Nov 23rd at 9:05 pm
Nice
Nov 23rd at 9:07 pm
This is great! I love how wordpress is getting more user friendly all the time. This will really help me focus on what my readers are responding to.
Nov 23rd at 9:11 pm
if i could have a first born again, i would name them WordPress!
Nov 23rd at 9:19 pm
Nice! We may have to launch that time machine gizmo we’ve been working on in the back room just to call you on this
Nov 23rd at 9:20 pm
My blog is connected to my facebook and when people press like on my facebook it doesn’t to go my blog.
Nov 23rd at 9:22 pm
Hi Angela: Facebook has its own system for likes that works independently from the one on WordPress.com.
Nov 23rd at 9:20 pm
Thank you so much for this new feature! I hope you and the WordPress team have the happiest of Thanksgivings!
Nov 23rd at 9:21 pm
Two questions I have regarding subscribers:
1) When someone subscribes to receive automatic updates of my blog, does their act of opening and reading the automatic generated email count as a “READ” on the number of page views for the day?
2) Is there a way to limit what is included in the automatic email, i.e. only half of the blog, a “teaser”, so that they do have to click directly to my blog to read the rest or is that bad form?
Nov 23rd at 10:28 pm
1) We try to track this, but it depends on the email client your reader is using.
2) We don’t currently have any plans for this feature, but subscription emails for posts with a more tag will only show the part of the post before the more tag.
Nov 26th at 10:55 pm
2) I was wrong. In your blog’s dashboard, go to Settings → Reading and check out the “For each article in a feed, show:” setting. If you pick “summary”, your blog’s feeds and subscription emails will show only a snippet of your post. If you explicitly set an excerpt, that will be used. Otherwise, the first few lines of your post will be used.
If anyone has further questions, please contact support.
Nov 23rd at 9:26 pm
no puedo leer si no esta en espaniol
Nov 23rd at 9:28 pm
This is wonderful! Happy Thanksgiving to everyone at WordPress.
Nov 23rd at 9:28 pm
Spanish: Excelente, sólo que muchos emails pueden no gustarle a los editores de blogs, sin embargo esto depende desde luego de la popularidad o grado de calidad de los post´s.
Nov 23rd at 9:32 pm
That’s a great idea! Thanks WordPress!!
http://www.tiallarising.wordpress.com
Nov 23rd at 9:36 pm
Great!! thank you!!
Nov 23rd at 9:37 pm
Very much liking these features…now just need to get me some subscribers!
Nov 23rd at 9:40 pm
Great!!! You always anticipate our expectations.Much-needed notifications and good time savers.
Thanks a million
Nov 23rd at 9:40 pm
As good as it is, I think we need a place where there’s a list of people who liked a post, similar to how it is for comments.
Nov 23rd at 10:17 pm
If you look near the like button on your blog post, you’ll find rows of Gravatars, one for each person who liked your post. This isn’t displayed in the same way as comments, but it is a list you can use to see who has liked your post and who they are. Mouse over each image for more information about them.
Nov 23rd at 9:40 pm
Hello WordPress
My comment to your e-mail announcement is, that I think it is a good idea.
Have a nice day.
Kind regards
David Amon Dahl
Nov 23rd at 9:41 pm
This works for our blog! Thanks!! http://www.passportpaper.com
Nov 23rd at 9:44 pm
Wonderful Thank you!!
Is there anyway that we WORDpress users can get the same (followers app/thingie – by google) like they have on blogger?? Or do we have that already? I am new to wordpress ….. so sorry for the question!!
Joseph Palotas
Nov 23rd at 10:39 pm
Hi Joseph: My mindreading machine isn’t working at the moment – what do you mean by thingie? Can you provide a URL or a screenshot or a sketch on a napkin so I might know what you’re taking about? thanks.
Nov 23rd at 9:44 pm
I like this
Nov 23rd at 9:47 pm
Thanks, Scott. That makes everything better. I’m going to click the “Like” button so that someone somewhere gets a happy email.
Nov 23rd at 9:49 pm
Like the layout of the blog and fairly easy to use; would like to know if anyone is acually reading my comments. Thanks
Nov 23rd at 10:05 pm
I read your comment – twice in fact – we like comments.
Nov 23rd at 10:02 pm
Seems pretty useless to me (I hate getting auto-generated e-mail). It would be nice to have a stats page that would let me drill down to get who liked particular posts or who my subscribers were. That would be far more useful than more spam for my e-mail box.
Nov 23rd at 10:55 pm
More email isn’t for everyone – we’d be most pleased if you made use of the checkbox to turn it off.
We are thinking about better ways to give bloggers feedback on the activity on their blog. Thanks for the feedback.
Nov 23rd at 10:04 pm
Can we be notified when someone hates our posts? How about when someone is actively indifferent to a post?
Nov 23rd at 10:37 pm
At the WordPress.com R&D lab we experimented with an “actively indifferent” button: no one clicked on it.
Nov 23rd at 10:04 pm
I like this we need to know. Thanks much.
Nov 23rd at 10:10 pm
Thank you for your thoughtfulness! Hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving Day.
Nov 23rd at 10:11 pm
Yeeeaaahhh!!!! this is nice.
Nov 23rd at 10:18 pm
I agree with what’s been said before, having this somewhere in the stats would be way more useful than getting even more e-mail. :-/
Nov 23rd at 10:22 pm
everytime I think of a feature, which would be nice, but is missing – soon, you put it in. do you have cameras in my head?
Nov 23rd at 10:29 pm
It was a great surprise to receive my first email about a new subscribers. Thanks so much. I really appreciate this feature as well as the ability to turn it off and on. WordPress.com is the best as always.
Nov 23rd at 10:33 pm
Thank you. Bruce
Nov 23rd at 10:46 pm
Nice! I’ve love to know who likes my posts, I think I have 2 lol
Nov 23rd at 10:57 pm
liking this
Nov 23rd at 11:00 pm
“And if you have a particularly active blog” Don’t I wish. This is another great idea. What is it with other people who don’t use WordPress?
Nov 23rd at 11:11 pm
Awesome. Thank you!
Nov 23rd at 11:13 pm
NIce… “Like”
Nov 23rd at 11:19 pm
It is needed. Thank you!
Nov 23rd at 11:37 pm
Good to know about it. Happy Thanksgiving!
Nov 23rd at 11:40 pm
Scott, I just started this blog. It seems great, but I find Word Press to be a bit cumbersome. I just can’t replace the long, rectangular picture with my own picture. Can’t easily find the photo edits commands. Do you have an idea of how to swap out my main picture? Larr
Nov 23rd at 11:53 pm
Welcome to WordPress. Your best bet in learning the basics is to head over to WordPress.com Support, which has tons of resources and forums for all of your questions.
Head over here: http://en.support.wordpress.com/
Nov 23rd at 11:41 pm
Good to know about this feature. Thanks a lot and have Happy Thanksgiving Day!
Nov 23rd at 11:48 pm
Good to know about this feature. The people at the WordPress.com R&D are very considerate of users’ needs.
Nov 23rd at 11:53 pm
thank you for this. very informative indeed.
http://www.loyaltothemagisterium.wordpress.com
Nov 23rd at 11:56 pm
Thank you!
Nov 23rd at 11:58 pm
Good news — thanks a lot.
Nov 24th at 12:06 am
Great!
just when I was thinking of having this feature you introduced it. (Y)
Nov 24th at 12:15 am
Terrific! Finally something I can use at this very moment – I’ve been meaning to find more ways of gaining feedback.
Great job WordPress!
Nov 24th at 12:15 am
that is wonderful
but would be much greater to have that in the stats page rather than the current need to fly into the post page to see if someone liked a post. simply giving this stats in the stats pages would make, at least me, happier.
thank you for all the great work.
Nov 24th at 12:22 am
That´s a great idea! It makes sense to know the “audience” you´re getting.
Thank you
Nov 24th at 12:33 am
sounds like a great idea! I might even be surprise to find subscribers that I didn’t even know about!
Thanks WP
Nov 24th at 12:56 am
Just what I’ve been waiting for. Thank you!
Nov 24th at 1:01 am
It’s nice, but I do to wish there was a place to turn off the emails …. I’ve got like 20 messages in my box from reply’s from other people …
Also the thingie, I looked and of course can’t find it … What I mean is … when I got to some other’s blogs, there is a side bar that has the word : Followers and you can click to follow the blog instead of RSS …… does that help?
Maybe we could get the facebook like as well !?!
Joe
Nov 24th at 8:22 am
There is a place to turn off the emails, check the end of the post for instructions.
Nov 24th at 1:04 am
it can be useful…
I loved the ideia…
Nov 24th at 1:36 am
A long time need fulfilled, especially the subscription thing. Thank you wordpress.
Nov 24th at 1:46 am
Thank you WordPress!
Nov 24th at 1:56 am
I just started blogging yesterday so this is great news as I won’t know any better, this sounds great! KEEP IT UP!
Nov 24th at 1:57 am
Thank you — I can hardly keep up with the WordPress changes/cool new features
!
Nov 24th at 2:05 am
Great addition! Thanks, WordPress, for all the new goodies!
Nov 24th at 2:07 am
I hate getting pinged by e-mail notifications, so I’ll keep this off. Thanks anyways
Nov 24th at 2:33 am
Very cool! I LIKE that! Consider this my LIKE notification to you
Nov 24th at 2:56 am
yes. i like what you’ve set up as far as it goes. being able to turn it off is the key…. just in case you do start getting a lot of likes and subscribers (or for any reason). however, i’ve been wanting what others above have suggested. . . something in the stats, possibly that can be drilled down with a list of people who like post, which posts and how many posts that person has liked. i know i can see the gravatar info – but that is limited to what they’ve put in to be seen. most i’ve seen (which is not a lot) do not include their own blog. i’d like being able to go to the blog of someone who likes my post to see what they are doing and understand where they are coming from a little more – much as in a comment, i can go see their blog immediately. the stats page would be a great place for this imo. still, above all the learning curve when joining WP and that learning here is an ongoing study – this is a great blogging platform (imo) and i like what you do and your thinking and attitude and the direction(s) you are moving in – so thank you – keep at it, i am going to keep at it too. aloha and good T-day on you.
Nov 24th at 3:03 am
I have 136 subscribers. I want to receive an email when someone unsubscribes. Is that possible?
Nov 24th at 8:21 am
This isn’t possible right now.
Nov 24th at 3:03 am
Just smart!
Nov 24th at 3:13 am
As a blog reader, I find the idea of these notifications very intrusive. How much information is provided?
Nov 24th at 8:21 am
Your name, a link to blog, a link to your Gravatar profile and a best guess at where you’re from in the world. You can update your profile to change or remove this information.
Nov 24th at 3:15 am
It is good to be liked
Nov 24th at 3:34 am
what a great idea, I’ve looked for that and now I know why I never found it
thanks again
peace n abundance,
CheyAnne
http://cheyannesexton.etsy.com
Nov 24th at 3:40 am
Thanks. It would also be nice to have the option of being notified when someone hits one of the “share” buttons (Facebook, reddit, etc).
Nov 24th at 3:49 am
Thank you WP!
So now we know who subscribes to your blog and who likes your posts, but how about comments? I can only see the number of subscriptions to comments in particular posts but completely have no idea who the subscribers are and how to remove them as we can remove blog subscribers.
I’d much appreciate if you guys can improve that
Nov 24th at 3:55 am
“actively indifferent” button response… total LIKE!
Nov 24th at 3:56 am
Awesome. Thank you!
Nov 24th at 4:01 am
Too cool. thanks guys. Now it gets even better.
Nov 24th at 4:02 am
If only my posts were ever liked
Nov 24th at 4:26 am
great…but no anyone liking my post hehehe…
Nov 24th at 4:54 am
I must say this is a great idea, but since my blog has only a couple of readers, it ain’t gonna make much joy for me! But yeah. the feature sets keeps expanding and wordpress.com keeps getting better!
Nov 24th at 4:55 am
awsome facility it will give positive sign and will boost confidence of new bloggers. thanx for this.
Nov 24th at 4:59 am
I like how this works
Nov 24th at 5:12 am
this is something really cool
Nov 24th at 5:14 am
Gr888888888888888.
Thanks.
Tarun
Nov 24th at 5:26 am
Excellent effort ! Thanks a lot.
Nov 24th at 5:55 am
Someone likes your post definitely gives you a positivity and encourage you to another post. And your service regarding this is fantastic. I like it and appreciate you for this. Thanks.
Nov 24th at 5:55 am
wonderful addition, thank you!
Nov 24th at 6:03 am
Like it to
Nov 24th at 6:17 am
nice
Nov 24th at 6:26 am
All feedback helps. Many thanks.