The Power Of Desperation Or How Bloggers Encourage Comment Spammers
- Image by thespotter via Flickr
Oh, Yeah! I said it!
Your eyes are not deceiving you because I do believe that Comment Spammers are directly encouraged by bloggers driven by a desperation to get activity on their blogs.
I have no plans to lay the blame here but instead encourage those just starting with the wonderful form of online publishing that blogging has become to stay strong and resist the urge to approve those few first comments on your new, shiny blog.
I know exactly how it feels when you labor on idea, you do the research, you work hard to create content that you KNOW worth the attention and yet…
Nobody comes, or what is even worse – people do come but don’t participate!
No comments left on your blog and you left to wonder if what you have created is even provides the value you thought it does. This is where the dangerous zone begins.
Since you have put some much work into your content – it will begin to score well with Search Engines and comment spammers often are some of the first people to recognize it. They swarm a new blog producing high quality unique content and start leaving crap comments just to get their links on your pages.
They know that in time – your content will give them benefits of quality links to their spam sites!
And I also know how hard it might be to send that VERY FIRST comment on your blog into spam folder, where it belongs! After all, it’s just one… right?
Wrong!
Once your blog is identified as accepting spam – you will get more, a lot more and can actually hurt your blog overall quite badly as linking out to bad sites can lead to penalty by Google.
How To You Get More Participation On New Blog?
There are several things you can do to get more comments on your blog, no matter how new it i, as long as your content is good. People love sharing opinion – you just have to give them a reason!
But before you do anything else – you need to create a clear Commenting Policy. I’m not going to go into details as I have previously shared how in this post – Create Clear Comment Policy To Avoid Spam.
Once that in place – you have several options to consider and one of the most important is How Do You Reward Commenters who take the time to take part on your blog, interact with you and with other readers?
I’m a HUGE advocate of rewarding people with quality links for the time they took out of their life to contribute to my content and I do using several plugins, which I can recommend:
- LuciaLinkyLove - allows me to provide DoFollow links to comments who have 3 or more approved comments on my blog. I provided direct link to plugin file but developer stopped supporting it, although in my experience it works just fine with latest versions of WP. If you discover that link no longer works – search for other DoFollow plugins in WordPress Repository.
- CommentLuv – this one gives people links to their latest blog posts. I have covered it step-by-step in my previous post and if you are interested to learn – read details about it in CommentLuv Plus DoFollow Equal Unlimited Link Love post.
- Comment Relish – this is a superb little plugin that allows you to send a thank you email to a first time commenter on your blog. Even though it is an automated reply if you do proper customization – it doesn’t have to be a dry message, it can be fairly personal! Great plugin to have on your blog to encourage people to return and comment again!
There are a few more plugins you can use but those 3 I think should give you the base functionality to reward commenters and now you only have one thing left to do…
Get People To Comment On Your Blog!
Hmmm, seems like we are back to square one, huh?
Well, not really, because now your blog is READY TO REWARD people for taking the time to provide valuable comment and you just have to let them know about it. While doing proper on-page SEO is a MUST – for a new blog it might not generate the results you are expecting.
But this is where the power of social networks comes into play! I know many people disregard Social Networks traffic as useless and I have to disagree with that statement. I have always strongly believed that matching traffic type to the action you need is crucial for a traffic to be effective.
Socail Networks exist for one main reason – people want to interact!
And what does your blog need? Comments, interaction! Seems like a perfect fit to me and all you have to do is bring the people from social networks to your blog pages!
Twitter and Facebook couple of the most obvious choices and if you don’t spam them – you can get people to come and participate. I think Twitter is especially effective. In fact I personally use it and describe how in my free report “Tweet Your Blog”
But you can go beyond automation and actually actively engage into conversation within social network and get a LOT more traffic from it. I have written one os the strategies you can use in How To Turn TweetDeck Into Blogging Inspiration – it is a VERY direct way to get people interested into what you have to say and I guarantee, if you do it effectively – you will see new comments
Hardest Part is to get commenting started on your blog but once you get few – power of Social Proof takes over and when people see that others are commenting, participating – they will as well. It is incredible on how seeding a few first comments can help you boost overall participation!
Whew…. did I ever stray from the original topic, huh?!
Well if you find this post useful – comment please and use the social sharing buttons to invite others to do same! Thanks.
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=4e7c4b70-2cef-455f-8b7e-835199fe8771)
More Options Print This Page! Subscribe With RSS Reader Subscribe by EmailFiled under Blogging |
Related posts: |
About The Blog Author
Alex Sysoef is an IT Consultant, Internet Marketer and ProBlogger who shares his passion and knowledge of WordPress, SEO, Social Media and traffic strategies on his blog WordPress Howto Spotter. Connect on Twitter or Facebook
54 Responses to “The Power Of Desperation Or How Bloggers Encourage Comment Spammers”
Trackbacks/Pingbacks
-
RT @TheSpotter The Power Of Desperation Or How Bloggers Encourage Comment Spammers http://bit.ly/7DXcGu
-
The Power Of Desperation Or How #Bloggers Encourage Comment Spammers http://bit.ly/4M6uxW #blogging @thespotter #business
-
[...] The Power Of Desperation Or How Bloggers Encourage Comment Spammers [...]
-
RT @TheSpotter The Power Of Desperation Or How Bloggers Encourage Comment Spammers http://bit.ly/7DXcGu
-
The Power Of Desperation Or How Bloggers Encourage Comment Spammers http://bit.ly/5Zo80e
-
RT @TheSpotter The Power Of Desperation Or How Bloggers Encourage Comment Spammers http://bit.ly/7DXcGu
-
[...] Howtospoter.com [...]
-
RT @TheSpotter The Power Of Desperation Or How Bloggers Encourage Comment Spammers http://bit.ly/7DXcGu
Great post, Alex – and dead-on, as usual! Most people find it easier to get their Twitter followers to a blog post than to a sales link, so bloggers should use that to their advantage…
You show 3 good plugins for encouraging good comments – which plugins do you recommend to help block spam comments?
.-= Doug Champigny´s last blog ..Shut Up, Buck Up, Buckle Down and Get On With It! =-.
Thanks Doug,
I use Akismet and WP SpamFree on my blogs – seem to create best combination of functionality and protection, to me at least.
I’m currently just using Akismet on my blog for spam protection and I was wondering why you choose to use the other plugin as well. I haven’t yet seen a comment get tagged incorrectly by Akismet so I would just like some advice from a more experienced WordPress user.
.-= Chris, World Traveler´s last blog ..Gain More, Keep Less =-.
Twitter: barbaraling
says:
CommentLuv is definitely a fantastic way to find new commentors!
Another way to get commentors is to post an idea at a forum with a link back to the original post of your blog (if the forum encourages that). And posting on FB, using Ping.fm, etc.etc.etc. – it all works together to help increase your popularity online.
.-= Barbara Ling, Virtual Coach´s last blog ..Today’s Make Money Tip – Take advantage of 75% HUGE discounts for killer affiliate/blog/Wordpress tools =-.
Barbara,
Excellent idea, as far as I know you are one of the best when it comes to integrating forums and blogs so I can assume this is tested
Have to agree it is very hard to delete the first few comments even though in your heart you know they are spam. It needs to be done.
Agree on your spam protection plugins too as I use both and it kills most of the spam from the get go.
.-= Mike Paetzold´s last blog ..Phantom Link Cloaker 2.0 Review =-.
Hey Mike,
Thanks for taking the time to comment. I find it quite often that when bloggers try different thing they generally end up on mostly same plugins for same functionality.
I think a few things such as stability, support, functionality and playing nice together with the rest of the blog contributes to that and that is exactly why we provide our Expert WordPress package with a specific set
Forums work great for me. Mostly because I have joined up with others on the forums. We retweet each other posts and go to each others blogs to comment.
I seems like once there is one comment it makes it easier for others to comment also.
I also have a list of sites I read often. I like to comment when I visit. This has also brought comments.
Thanks Alex – great post as usual. I always learn something new.
Sheila
.-= Sheila´s last blog ..21 Lessons I Learned In 2009 That Gave Me The Greatest Return On My Investment =-.
Yes, Sheila
The initial first comment is the most important conversation starter – I think it acts as a social proof and gets the ball rolling.
I was dofollow for ages, but I stopped it. I got marked as a “dofollow” blog, which means I’m on thousands of lists that are passed shonky forums & websites, saying “go to these websites, put your keywords in your title, make sure you leave a quality comment, nudge nudge, wink wine
”. So I’m disagreeing with you on being dofollow. If anybody feels they should comment because they get a backlink, then I don’t want them to comment.
Other than that I do agree with what you say
.-= Rhys´s last blog ..3 Blogging Phrases That Died in 2009 (and 3 Phrases That Replaced It) =-.
Rhys,
Well, its all matter of opinion. And I didn’t say I think people should expect link back for commenting. I think it is how appropriate to reward good commenters! This is how blogosphere was designed to work and I don’t see why silly rules by big “G” should change that. Considering that in May of this year Matt Cutts announced officially that Google ignores their own “nofollow” attribute and still follows the link just with slightly less juice – what is the reason not to?
Great post. I’m a new reader of your blog and like what I see! You’re dead on as I just launched a new blog myself and I was itching for comments. I received some good comments and some spam as well. I did throw some in the ol spam box, but I do admit I let a few slip by that didn’t seem that bad.
.-= Zack´s last blog ..Facebook and Twitter for Business =-.
Hey Alex,
I too was very excited when I got my first comment only to find out it was spam. I’ve learned from your previous posts to use anti spam plugins and they help a lot. I also find that replying to comments also helps in getting more comments. It shows that there is a real conversation on the topic. I often check the “notify of follow up” button and when there’s a reply I go back to the site to check – gets more traffic and maybe more comments. Great post as always Alex
.-= Luca Di Nicola´s last blog ..So Many Deals – So Little Time =-.
Luca,
Yes, I agree – when blogger fails to reply to comments, it discourages people from doing it again. And I obviously mean here people who were interested in your content
Boy and I thought I was really popular with all of those spam comments.-:) I do like your ideas about those plug ins giving you some help with the commenting. I use comment luv now and will have to give the others a try. The social networking is an incredible way to get out there even more and I really like that idea. Thanks for the tips.
.-= Andre Arnett´s last blog ..Do You Walk The Walk And Talk The Talk? =-.
Thanks Andre,
That is why I love WP, there are always useful plugins.
I think the best way to reward those who comment on your blog is to check out their blog and comment on it.I never worry about that there will be no one comments on my site.What I worry about is that I don’t have time to interact with other bloggers.To get a good interaction with bloggers.I need to bookmark their site and comment on it reguraly.People like comments.In return,many people will come to visit my site and comment on it too.
Darni,
Yes, I agree and when time permits I do go and comment on other people blogs.
I’m a big fan of encourage comments by way of reward and I think the plugins you’ve selected are worthy of mention. That being said, CommentLuv is my fav.
Regards,
Karl
.-= Karl Foxley´s last blog ..The Really Sneaky CommentLuv Trick For Better Blog Marketing And Promotion! =-.
I'm with you
OK I’ve got a thing or two to say. (Surprised?) lol
First and foremost, the #1 hands down traffic/comment generation technique as well as relationship building all rolled into one, is commenting on other blogs. Period
.
Iv too use and recommend Lucias and Commentluv, although I had no idea Lucias is now unsupported…where did you read this?
Comment Relish – quickly renamed comment rubbish and for good reason, albeit completely the users fault for abuse. If you are going to use it, for the love of god please set it to run on the FIRST NEW COMMENT ONLY, not every single time the same commenter leaves a comment.
.-= Dennis Edell´s last blog ..UPDATE! 4 Plugin Package – 75% Off! PLUS Something Extra From Me!
Dennis,
Great points and I agree that Comment Relish should email only on first email.
Lucia stopped supporting that plugin a while back from what I know. It still works great on my blog so I continue to recommend it but if you go to her blog – you will see what I mean. I think she moved on from programming to blogging about her other passions.
Alex, you are right about the feeling that I (people) get after putting up a post with what I think is good and useful content and then no one seems to notice or care. Thanks for the great comments/tips on how to get more people to particate and also to comment on your blob.
.-= Lonnie Minton´s last blog ..Adding Integration Into Your Affiliate Marketing =-.
I came across this post via a link on Mike Paetzold’s WPtutorial blog and boy am I glad I did! This is an awesome post!
I remember the days when I wanted to approve any and all comments on my blog. I had already known that comments encourage more comments so I was just so anxious to get some kind (any kind) of interaction.
I’m already using CommentLuv on one of my blogs … now I just need to get it on the rest of them. And I simply cannot wait to look into comment relish. Thanks for that little gold nugget!
One thing I did learn over the years is to not give up. Keep encouraging comments over and over and over again. Keep asking for your readers opinions. Keep asking open ended questions. Keep asking for their own tip. If you keep after them eventually they’ll give in
I’ve only read a few of your posts here so far and am loving what I’m seeing. Between you and Mike I’m adding two more blogs to my regular reading lists tonight!
.-= Anita DeFrank´s last blog ..Three WordPress Plug-ins for Better SEO =-.
Great post Alex,
I already use CommentLUV on most of my blogs and I think I remember you talking about LuciaLinkyLove before. I had not heard about CommentRelish though until now.
Looks like I have some blogs to go back to and add some plug-ins to.
You are right about it though in that you need to encourage comments and having these plug-ins definitely help as well.
I know that a lot of times when I am looking for a blog to comment on I am usually looking for blogs with CommentLUV and that are do-follow.
I am also working on getting my blogs setup to tweet to twitter as I post. I already have and have had a couple of them setup for this for over a year now, but need to get the others going as well.
One question, when tweeting the post to twitter, do you feel it is better to have a separate twitter account for each site or can you put several blogs to one twitter account?
.-= Brett McEllhiney´s last blog ..Niche Site Club 30 Day $1 Trial is Just in Time For Christmas! =-.
you give a very good title, I think every person who read the title you will stop for a moment and read all the articles you write inside… because the contents of the article is good too … I like your blog!