Blog Comment Success

Is commenting on other blogs worth my time?

Strictly from a web traffic and SEO standpoint, maybe! From an increase in popularity, rss subscribers and general readership, yes! Its a well known SEO phenomenon that back-links, especially one way back-links, can increase your overall page rank. Most blogs offer a method by which visitors are able to comment on their blog posts/pages. Most comments require you to enter three pieces of information before leaving a comment, your name, e-mail address and website URL. When anyone comments on a new post they receive a back-link to their site which is created from the name field (in the form of text) and the website URL (in the form of a link). Normally your name serves as a text-link which provides a back-link to your URL. Sounds simple right? Well, not really. Commenting on blogs can eat up a substantial amount of time and if not done correctly can be completely worthless (at least in my opinion).

Here are some ways to improve your back-link success from comments:

Quality Comments:

I can’t tell you how many spam comments (or at least comments I believe to be spam) I delete or un-approve from my blogs every week. There are Internet marketers who feel they can abuse the system by creating general comments and submitting them to hundreds of blogs everyday. This method of commenting really annoys me for a number of reasons. Automated commenting decreases the quality of the web. Creating uniform comments adds no valuable content to a website or blog, and is annoying to boot. It’s also the quickest way to reduce your blogs chances of increasing the number of quality back-links. I’m not the only blogger on the planet who deletes random, pointless and spam comments from their blog. I would venture to say, that most bloggers, especially those who are somewhat successful at what they do, approve or deny each individual comment left on their blog. It does become increasingly frustrating to have to do this (especially if there are a large number of comments), but I suppose its the nature of the beast. My advice to you is to leave only quality comments! With that said, let me move on to my next point.

Read the Post:

Nothing is more frustrating than shuffling through comments which don’t pertain to your article. If you are going to leave a comment, no matter what the purpose, read the article or post before doing so. This is a good idea for a number of reasonss. First, you might be surprised by the content of the article and you might even learn something and maybe get ideas for future blog posts. Secondly, you may be able to help a fellow blogger (after all we are all in this together). Lastly, if you are going to take the time to post a comment, you might as well take a minute or two, read the article and leave a quality comment. Overall, reading new posts and creating quality comments will increase the likelihood of your comment being read and approved.

Use your name:

One of the three required comment fields is your name. Don’t be sucked into entering the name of your website in this field. No matter how great the comment is, if you don’t leave your name it may not get approved. I understand the value of keyword linking systems (ie. back-links using site specific keywords). But, as I mentioned earlier if I leave a comment and it’s viewed as spam, it won’t get listed and you may even be banned from leaving comments in the future. This isn’t to say there’s no way around creating quality back-links from the comments you leave. Many times I use my name followed by my site name when commenting (J. Stanley – Y Internet Marketing). This may bring a bit of professionalism to your comment and increase the value of your back-link at the same time. I know there are mixed thoughts on this topic, so feel free to leave a comment and let me know what you think?

Leave comments on high page rank blogs:

There’s no denying the fact that obtaining one way back-links from high page rank sites is extremely valuable, at least from an SEO standpoint. If you have a choice, choose sites which have achieved higher page ranks. On the flip side, this isn’t to say that leaving comments on quality blog posts found on sites with low page ranks is bad, its just not as valuable. Providing useful feedback for new bloggers is a great way to gain readership and can help fellow bloggers along the way.

Comments are a great way for you to develop a sense of community with your fellow bloggers. Don’t abuse the system and you may increase readership, page rank and loyalty.