Some folks have realized that they don’t necessarily have to be bloggers to benefit from blog traffic, and have taken to commenting on blog posts to increase traffic and links.
It’s not the best method out there, but hey, whatever pays your rent.
Seriously though, if you’re incorporating blog commenting into your overall traffic plan (you do have an Overall Traffic Plan don’t you? Mon Dieu…) and you’re new to commenting, here’s …
11 Idiotic Things Commenters Can Do to Guarantee a Pissed Off Blogger.
You know, the one who you hope will publish your comment and send you traffic.
Yes. I’m looking at YOU. If you’ve ever done one of these, and you were a new blogger or I knew you from somewhere, I probably let it slide the first time and sent you an email. If your comments disappear after that?
It’s probably because you did one or more of the following. Take heed. I’m not the only who gets pissed off by these…
1- Be Sure Not To Use Your Real Name.
We don’t care who you are, and we Love to enhance the credibility of our blog with links out to people who think their keyword is more important than their identity.
Hint: Most people will find John Doe , the Your Keyword-er to be acceptable.
2- Make Your Comment as Generic As Possible.
We’d never figure out that your comment couldn’t possibly have anything to do with our specific post.
3- Be an Ass Kisser to Increase Your Chances.
Of getting deleted.
4- Leave your Link in the Body of the Comment.
Because I didn’t see it in that spot that says “URL” or “link”. And it won’t get auto-moderated into a queue where I will then remove it.
5- Cut and Paste the Same Comment Everywhere.
I don’t ever go to other sites. I’m a blogger not a- hey, wait, I’m a BLOGGER. By Definition I go to other sites. What do you know about that?
6- Be Way, Way Off Topic.
Every conversation, sooner or later, is about Viagra, isn’t it? Thanks for skipping the foreplay. Real time saver.
7- Send a Fake Trackback.
If I’m a busy blogger, they won’t get moderated until right before Google would give you some potential credit. And speaking of Do Follow/I Follow/No No Follow…
8- If I’m a DoFollow Blogger, Make it Apparent that You Could Care Less About Interacting, And Just Want a Link
That’s SURE to get me to turn off the NoFollow attribute for that comment. Oh, you didn’t know we could control that? Sucks to be you.
9- Mistake My Blog for the Support Department.
If you’ve got a question for me? You should probably use the email I gave you.
Or the form on the site.
Or the email address on the site.
Or if it was a phone order, the number on the sales page.
Or the direct number I gave you.
Or Facebook private message. Or Stumble Upon private message.
For reals? You should ONLY resort to a blog comment as a means of reaching support if all other methods fail.
And then you should do something in your comment that would get it moderated, but not as spam, being as how you’re always including your credit card number, phone number, home address or some other personal information that I cringe at when I finally moderate comments later on in the day.
10 – Never Come Back.
What freak show said that comments were about community? If God wanted comments to have anything to do with community he would have started the words with the same four letters.
Why should you form partnerships or get to know me for a while, so your request for a favor later won’t sound off the wall and out of the blue?
11- Ignore My Comment Policy.
I wrote it for my health, not for something silly like, oh, I dunno, your benefit. That’s not why I put a link to it on every page and again under the big button.
Of course, to be fair, in the old theme it doesn’t look like a link. But it’s not like I’m the only person whose comment policy you’ve ignored.
Why pay attention to some page I took time out of my life to write? It’s not like it gives you guidelines guaranteed to help you get your comment published, so that if all you want is a link anyway, you can get it.
It’s not as if I might to Stumble, del.icio.us, Sphinn, or even Digg the sites of people who comment on my posts, or include them in a post on another day. Why should you bother to increase your chances of getting as many free one-way, traffic sending links as possible?
Don’t be silly.
