Revising My Commenting Policy – Keywords Gone!

All bloggers have a comment policy even if they don’t announce it and I am no exception. I’m not really a fan of having a written comment policy on the blog because quite simply, the only people who would even bother to read it would be people that don’t have to worry about it! With that said, I thought it would be polite to mention this change as it is going to mean that more people’s comments are being deleted than before.

I know that I am well known in this niche for my use of blog commenting as a traffic strategy. I did it myself for many months and that activity gave this blog the initial kickstart that it needed so of course many new bloggers do the same in order to get traffic and links. But blog comments should always enhance the post – they should provide something interesting to read, both for the blogger and other readers of the blog.

Pointless Comments

Any one-liners like ‘great post’ have always been deleted but I am seeing now people leaving the same one liners but just making them a bit more verbose. Taking a dozen words to say ‘great post’ still doesn’t add any value – it just gives people more words to read and wastes more of their time! I have found myself deleting an increasing number of these comments of late. Due to the natural growth of the blog, there is a natural growth in the number of comments left but unless these are valuable, it simply adds noise to the post which is of no benefit to those readers who like to read the comments and join in the discussion.

Now I don’t automatically delete all posts like this. I read all my comments and I take notice of who leaves them and there are always a handful of regular commenters who just comment because they are taking part in the community. If one of those people leaves a comment like that I’ll leave it but when there is a newcomer who has not been very active and has nothing better to say than’ great post’ (or something else that’s similar) then I’ll still delete it.

Keywords as Names

This has always been a pet peeve of mine. It is well known that a backlink containing your keywords is much stronger than a backlink with irrelevant words such as your name but let’s face it, when you leave a comment with ‘forex trading’ or something similar as your name, we all know that you’re only really commenting to get the backlink. Just to be clear, this blog has always been and always will be nofollow in the comment section which means those comments aren’t useful backlinks anyway.

The reason it’s a pet peeve is that I read all the comments and when people say something useful or interesting I like to reply. I like to take part in the discussion along with my readers. I do my comment work once per day so usually there are a whole bunch of new comments on each post. My preferred format is to make one reply and address people individually with their name such as @Louis, blah blah. This is very difficult to do when people use keywords as their name.

Before now, my unwritten policy has always been that I would only allow a keyword-named comment if the commenter had clearly read the post and was posting something valuable. If it was in any way generic I wouldn’t hesitate to delete it. But frankly, I’m having to do this a lot more now and it’s just more time consuming so from now on I am making my own life that little bit easier – keyword comments will automatically be deleted. Use your name in the name field!

What About Name / Keyword Combos?

This is an interesting one. Some people will leave a name such as “John @ Writing School”. This solves the problem of not being able to reply easily but I often find that these end up being too long and they look messy in the comment section. I’m not doing anybody any favours by allowing keywords in names because the blog is nofollow so sorry, these will still be deleted! If you want to comment on this blog, use your name in the name field!

Comment Signatures

This is another pet peeve of mine. When you leave a comment you have a field into which you can put a URL – most people leave their blog/website so why on earth do some people feel the need to add a second URL at the end of the comment? What is worse is that I have used the CommentLuv plugin for many months now which will automatically give bloggers a second link.

What I used to do before, was edit the comment to remove the signature but that is way too time consuming so once again I’m making my own life easier here – leave a sig and your comment will get deleted!

How Are Comments Viewed By Others?

Ignoring the backlink issue here (which is moot on a nofollow blog), the main reason to comment as a ’strategy’ is to get traffic. How do you get traffic? By other people clicking through to your link. Why would they do that? One reason only – something you have said has sparked their interest and they want to know what else you have to say so they click through to your link to find out more about you.

Alternatively, with the CommentLuv plugin, if the title of your latest post is intresting that can draw in traffic without even needing an interesting comment! But let me ask you this, as a reader of blogs and of blog comments, what do you think when you see a comment that has a keyword in the name and leaves a signature at the end? Me personally, I look at that and see a hardcore marketer. I immediately assume that their website or blog is just going to contain a lot of marketing hype and will probably offer very little value.

On the other hand when I see people like Hendry Lee actively commenting, leaving genuinely useful comments time after time I am inclined to assume that his blog is going to contain lots of useful posts and I am far more likely to click through to it and take a look. I truly believe that if you want to make the most of your  blog commenting strategy you should leave the marketing out of it and focus purely on value.

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