Gee, blog commenters these days have some really strange names.
Like who would think to name their kid “seo strategies“, “plumbing fixtures” or “cheap shoes“?
Seriously, you gotta wonder what some folks are thinking when they post comments like this to a business opportunities / Internet marketing blog like NetProfits Today:
First of all, the NPT blog is about Internet and affiliate marketing, so WHY would a knowledgeable blog commenter use a name like “weddings” or “buy LCD TV” to try and attract traffic to their site?
Uh, they wouldn’t.
It’s unlikely that “cheap shoes” will get their comment approved on professional blogs.
Business bloggers immediately see that “cheap shoes” is probably a spammer or a complete newbie who has wasted money on a bad training course. And it makes me feel sad when “cheap shoes” actually does leave a good comment, but they’ve contravened my blog commenting policy so I can’t approve their comment.
The policy specifically states that “‘nice post, thanks’ type comments from “Buy LCD TV” posters will be marked as spam, so it is in your best interest to contribute to the conversation as a real person, if you are looking for some link love.”
I have no desire to reward cheap traffic seekers who contribute nothing of value.
Even if the comment does get approved, it’s too much of a crap shoot to hope that people who are interested in doing business online might also be planning a wedding or in the market for a new TV.
So, if you want traffic to a site about weddings, go post a comment on a site where the topic is about weddings.
Having said all that, a real affiliate marketer can drive traffic to their wedding site from a blog about affiliate marketing, but they have to be smart about it.
“Smart” means:
- Building credibility by contributing value to the conversation. If your site is about weddings and the post is about traffic strategies, share an experience related to the topic and invite folks to look at a relevant page on your blog.
- Using your real name or a pen name. Not just a first name either. You gain additional credibility for your blog comment by including your real FULL name. Even something like Super Affiliate Wendy W. is more likely to encourage visits than “cheap shoes”.
- Having a Gravatar. Want even more credibility? Get a gravatar to show alongside your thoughful comment.
All that said, remember that you want traffic that stays on your site.
The fellow who pops by “acia berry wonders” from a bizop blog won’t help your bounce rate if he only sticks around for a half a second.
So take the time to post real comments using your real name and point to content on your site of real value to your visitors.
Get your sites indexed faster and gain higher search engine rankings in the long run with a great blog commenting strategy that works. Blog Comment Demon software and ebook package will help you find one-way quality related links to your sites, without spamming. Start increasing your Adsense income, affiliate commissions and sell more products, with Blog Comment Demon.
About Rosalind Gardner
I see it all the time with my blog also. I really like the comments of really nice blog something a long those lines.
Thanks Greg Ellison
Hi Ros,
Sensible advice as always! I get so many of these on my blog. Why do they bother? I mean really? I have spam protection and never let these comment on so what is the point?
I guess they do get to some blogs. It is a bit like email spam.
Anyway, great content as always.
Sorry to read about your cat…..he lived a good life.
Your little puppy looks great fun.
M
Hi Ros
I know exactly how you feel about these blog comments that come from sites that are completely unrelated to the niche of your blog. These spammers are more of a nuisance than anything else. I found at one time that I was getting anything from 50 – 100 of these spam comments a day which although they were caught by Akismet still took time for me to delete. Fortunately I found out about the SI Captcha plugin and that had made all the difference. Thanks for bringing this subject to our attention.
Michelle Jayes
Ros, aren’t posters like “cheap shoes” more concerned about backlinks than traffic? There are definitely people teaching this technique because on some blogs, “cheap shoes” would become the anchor text for their website link. I wonder how much “link love” Google really does give such comments though.
Spot on Ros.
It’s the same with forums. I moderate a number of high profile forums and this mindless, terminal stupidity is a major problem. These days, offenders get the bum’s rush… their posts are deleted and the posters get booted and banned.
John
Hi John,
Good to hear from you. I hear you about the forums… I’m still sad that we had to close down the forum here at NPT. Just wasn’t worth the time or hassle anymore. Private member forums all the way now.
Cheers,
Ros
I’m currently getting way too many of these comments on a daily basis. Most, fortunately, do make it into the spam box instantly but some still manage to land in the queue for moderation.
It’s a shame that people resort to spamming in such a way. It’s also a shame to visit a number of blogs over the course of a week and see that these comments have been approved. In doing so, it just encourages these people to continue as the mentality seems to be ‘well at least some of the comments make it through’.
I always use my real name (but agree that a pen name is just as good) and I have a Gravatar; I want people to connect with me, see value in my comments and maybe pop on over to my site to find out more about me and what I have to offer.
Warmest regards,
Karl
LOL Rosalind I used to laugh at the insanity of some people’s idea of “how to get backlinks the easy way”…
Since I help more and more n00bs to get going with their efforts, and just as many with getting their blogging feet wet, I even recently created an article just to help them learn how to recognize the garbage comments in 30 seconds or less…
Personally I just use Akismet, which traps most of it.
Hi Alan,
I’m with you on Akismet, which I admit probably captures more spam that I would doing visual checks.
Cheers,
Ros
hi
on the one hand, yes…
who would name their child “cheap shoes”…..:)
and spammy comments don;t make it far either.
on the other hand…
maybe the people with the funny names are not really after traffic….
maybe they are just after anchor text links…
however…
as you pointed out – the lack of RELEVANCE makes it futile. After all – the only traffic you would get was from someone who wanted to see what you did on your site, to see if they could learn something from it, and Google would not pay much attention to a link from a totally irrelevant domain…
as you rightly said…
the keyword here is “knowledgeable” – obviously the people doing this have no idea what they are doing….
or they are using software to do it – i have recently seen some pretty creative comments caught by akismet. When you look closely, it is actually generic (something that will pass as a comment anywhere) – but at first glance it does not strike you as a spam comment.
so at least the real spammers are getting better…..:)
now if only they could get that relevancy thing right….
then they would stop sending me things about replica watches, etc…
one point to consider, though – if you want to use your blog comments as a branding tool, then maybe one should look at something like disqus – that keeps track of all your comments in one place – publicly.
just my 0.02c
peter
Hey Rosalind,
I completely agree with this post. Although I have a comment spam filter on my blog I still have to weed out some “spam” comments from my blog. I also experience it’s sometimes very difficult to separate a spam comment from a “normal” comment. The comment “looks” normal but when you go to their site you find out they are spammers or even scam sites.
-Albert Van Cutsem-
Oh my goodness, Roz. I was so happy to read this post. I’m a newbie and I thought I was doing something wrong to bring all these “strange name people” to my site. Well that–or they already had Alzheimer’s (which is what I write about) and couldn’t remember their real names. Appreciate the explanation!
Thanks for the great post!
Sandy
Hi Sandy,
Too cute… and you should be happy to know that whatever you are doing is right, because spammers don’t care much for low-traffic, invisible blogs.
Cheers,
Ros
You make some excellent points, Rosalind.
Comment spam is one of my biggest pet peeves about running a blog.
I recently added the word “dude” to the spam blocker field (the one that comes inside the admin panel of WordPress – I don’t use spam blocking plug-ins because they tend to block good comments, too). If someone takes 30 seconds to look at my site or the post they are commenting on – they would clearly know I am not a “dude.”
One final thought on this – there are many sites out there who use the KeywordLuv plugin – and those blogs welcome comments from those looking to build backlinks for specific keywords. (In the name field you enter Your Name @ Your Keywords).
Still, it is common courtesy to respect the bloggers who take that extra step by leaving thoughtful and engaging comments in return.
Thanks for sharing!
Hi Trish,
What a great idea… adding ‘dude’ to the spam word list!
BTW, you might like this article… http://netprofitstoday.com/blog/hey-dude-quit-calling-me-dude/
Cheers,
Ros
Hi Rosalind, have to agree with you over these names. I was actually working for someone blog commenting and they taught me to use the keyword as the name. However, when I would go back and check to see if they were approved nine times out of ten they were not. I would find the comments left with a real name were more likely to be approved for sure.
thanks.
This has been a long running problem for me – as well as just about every other serious blogger I suspect!
Something I had missed though was the idea of having a blog commenting policy – setting out in stone what is acceptable and what isn’t, so thanks for that.
I just had to go to your blog after seeing the excerpt in the email because I was getting about 10 of those kinds of comments everyday! These spammy comments were clogging up my email inbox (because I moderate all comments) and driving me nuts.
I tried about 3 different comment spam reducing plugins and none seemed to work except Askimet! The only drawback is buying the API key to activate it, but it is worth the $$ in my opinion.
Another thing I did was go back through my blogs and actually turn off the commenting on pages that didn’t make sense to comment on – like the contact page, about me or terms of service pages. You’d be surprised (or not) how many people leave spammy comments on those pages.
Thanks for your blog Roz.
Brian
Thanks for the Gravatar link. I was wondering how people did that. I had to bookmark the page to get back to it later, but the link is much appreciated!
Rosalind,
I’ve been working with small business owners and solo entrepreneurs who are just beginning to blog for their business. They will sometimes ask me what I think of this or that particular comment they’ve gotten which, to me , is obviously spam. But it confuses them because sometimes, the comment will get very close to sounding real. I advise them to take a look at the name and the website they’ve listed, usually a dead giveaway. So, I really appreciate you writing this explanation. I plan to refer my clients to it so I can save myself some time!
thanks,
Eunice
Hi Rosalind
Comment spam has to the the ultimate downside of blogging. I can’t imagine how much of it you must receive because I only get a tiny percentage of the traffic that you do but I still get a good number of “cheap shoes” type comments every day.
I just checked, and the latest comments on my blog are from people who had the misfortune to be born with names like “Plastic Surgery”, “Health Insurance Quotes”, “Forex Trading Signals”, “Toy Dogs” and “Coach Outlet”.
As for using your real name – well, I usually just go by the name LynnN when I comment but you shamed me into using my full name this time, lol.
Thanks for all the great information you keep giving to us, keep it up and don’t let the spammers grind you down
Warm Regards
LynnN
Rosalind,
You’re totally right ~AND ~ I don’t think it’s the traffic they’re after ~ it’s the link from your site. So many guru’s are out there telling people to use blog commenting as a way to get backlinks to better rank their sites in Google. While most tell people to make good comments that add to the conversation it seems a lot of people don’t listen and go in for the “cheap shoes”. It really makes me sad ~ I’ve had one particular person on my blog who comes in as “affiliate guru”. Makes somewhat decent comments, but I’m not going to approve “affiliate guru” comments ~ ESPECIALLY because I have keywordluv installed on my site. He could easily have a great keyword anchor text link for his site, but if you can’t read simple instructions… come on.
The other thing is this “affiliate guru” has 2 posts on his blog and tells you right up front he has no idea what he’s doing, come follow along as I make money online. *sigh* why do people continue to do that?
Great post, and I wish it were easier to get people to see the time and effort they are wasting with this simple and easily fixed mistake.
Hi Jackie,
You are absolutely right about the link luv they’re looking for. I think it’s a technique that Google will filter for sooner than later, so I can’t imagine why anyone would bother to waste their time trying it.
Cheers,
Ros
Rosalind,
I have to agree wholeheartedly with you…I seem to have to delete more and more spambot comments as the weeks go by from my blogs. Thankfully there is the option to have each new commenter’s responses be moderated before they go live
Hi Ron,
Are you only moderating for new commenters?
I moderate absolutely everything.
Cheers,
Ros
Roz,
I was also so happy to see your post about this topic this morning. I was beginning to wonder the same thing about why my blogs were attracting so many of these types of comments. It is sad to see so many people doing the right thing, the wrong way.
On top of the comments not being related to my niche, the majority of them obviously have not even read my blog, so the comments do not even make sense.
It really irritates me to see a comment like; “Nice blog, good information, love what you’ve done with your theme.” and see it’s from a p— site or some other niche that there is no way I would approve.
Net Profits Today is a PR 4 blog with an Alexa rank of 23,845. As others have mentioned, “Cheap Shoes” and others like him or her are looking for the anchor text link for their primary keyphrase from an authority site.
If Ros’s blog had a PR of 0 with an Alexa rank of 7,589,329 — Cheap Shoes would be no where in sight.
great subject…I get a ton of those spammy comments on my blog. I use askimet, and look briefly at the comments there to see if any of them look real. I even blogged about how I hate spam….and got a real comment from a reader saying that she was offended because she loves Spam (the food) until she read the post. Then she got it and had a good laugh.
Oh well…..blog on and watch for those funny sounding names! Thanks for your wisdom and insight as always, Ros…
I was going to change my name to Buy Really Good Stuff For Next To Nothing Before It’s Too Late At My Website before I read your post, Ros. I’m sure glad I read it.
Hilarious, Ken. Thanks for the laugh! ~ Ros
So you’re saying I shouldn’t post wedding tips about wearing cheap ladies shoes while finding recipes on an LCD TV. Got it.
Hi Stephanie,
Probably not, considering this comment went straight into the spam box courtesy of Akismet.
Cheers,
Ros
I’ve been told that you should put your web site name in as your name so people will know where you’re coming from. Anyway, I’ve added my real name to this post hoping it’s not spammy.
My favorite spam comment is still “Ran across your site while searching the web, It has the best Info I’ve ever seen, I bookmarked it and will definitely be back.”
And, of course, it comes from someone selling drugs online – or, um, cheap shoes!
DELETE!
Hey Evelyn,
You know what’s interesting? Akismet sent your comment straight to the spam box.
So…. was it the name you used or the comment content?
Hmmmm…
Cheers (and hugs)
Ros