Comments and interaction are a huge part of what makes a blog such an amazing socializing, teaching, and marketing tool. How many other forms of communication can users/readers interact with publishers and other users with ease?
Some commentators offer amazing insight and promote community while others try to tear a community apart or just waste our time. I’ve determines there are 4 reasons people comment:
Genuine Interaction With A Community
The whole point of a blog is to write about what you are passionate about. If you just so happen to be passionate about a product whose sales earn you money, that’s cool too.
The key is that passion breeds conversation and opinion. Have you ever spent time with someone who was burning with passion about a particular topic? You can’t get them to shut up, and they’ll tell you ten times more than you ever wanted to know… unless your passionate about the same things too.
That is how genuine interaction with a blog community works. You’re passionate about the same thing as the author. You have an opinion, and you could talk about it all day. You would comment even if you didn’t get links to your site as long as someone is willing to listen (even if it was only a tree).
This type of commentator is what makes a blog successful. This is the type of commenter I strive to be. And it helps me to also fit into the next type of commentator.
Publicizing A Site or Blog
Lets not kid ourselves here, if you have a blog or website, you’ve probably made comments with the motive of driving some traffic to your site. Many bloggers in the make money blogging/build your blog community advocate commenting other sites in your niche to help generate traffic.
There is a right way to do this and a wrong way:
The wrong way is to avoid the topic or simply promote something off topic. I think it’s bad practice to link directly to your own blog* (that’s why comments have the “website” part), although I think linking to another blogger’s site is okay as long as it is on topic.
The right way to do this is just be interactive with other blog readers in the community. The more value you add to the conversation, the more likely someone will want to check out your site without you asking.
*If you have something on your site -directly- related, it is okay, but I still don’t do it.
Instigate Controversy
Some people comment just to cause controversy. They are there to make people mad and get a reaction. These commentators will call the author names, other commentators “fanboys,” and dis any ideas or products mentioned. Copyblogger has an excellent article about how blog authors can overcome nasty trolls. I’ve always loved the saying do not feed the troll or DNFTT.
Fortunately, I haven’t dealt with any trolls on this site yet; however, some of the blogs I read have some very resilient trolls. Maybe I need to get a little more controversial? Either way, being a troll will get you attention, but not in a good way.
To Make Noise
The reason I frequently see people commenting is just to make noise. Half the time they didn’t even read the article, and you can tell. At first you might think that this type of commenter was trying to get their site exposure, but I don’t really agree.
Noise makers offer compelling comments like “I’m going to try that” or “great post.” I know my post was great and so do my other readers, you don’t have to tell us! Just Kidding… (kind of)…(no really..jk)
If you read a comment like “I really enjoyed your post,” would you really want to go read that person’s site? If you answered yes, you probably fit into this category. If someone left a comment bringing up a legitimate point the author didn’t address, you might get the impression that commenter has some good ideas or insight; those are the people who’s site you’d go visit. Don’t lie to yourself.
Summary
We can all relate to commenting for at least 3 of 4 of these reasons. Next time you go to comment, I challenge you to think about what you say before you hit submit. Make the most of the voice you have and earn the respect of the community by appropriately sharing your opinions; you’ll be shocked how far it will go.
No related posts.
Naw, man… I just wanna bleed off a bunch of your googly link juice… hehe…
Anyway, your point about linking into directly applicable posts is well-founded. Technically, that should be one of the BEST reasons to comment. After all, if you took the trouble to write 1000 words on something that would seriously add to the discussion, it would stand to – logical – reason to provide a link to it.
However… and this is *huge*… people don’t see it that way.
The website author tends to see it as undercutting his or her authority, that is, detracting from rather than adding to the conversation. And others tend to see it as blatant self-promotion.
Nowadays, I will do it, but only once in a while, and for very tightly constrained reasons. I even wrote a Practical WordPress Tip on how to do it elegantly.
I could link directly to that tip, using the advice in the tip as a wonderfully self-referential example, but I won’t.
.-= Dave Doolin | Website In A Weekend´s last blog ..WordPress Gotcha! Find Out If Your RSS Feed is Helping or Hurting =-.
Do you mean This Practical WordPress Tip?
I think It hard to clasify one commentator strict to one type. Me as example, I am sometime as genuine commentators, but sometime as publizing commentators, or even both of it in one time. It is depend of article topic.
.-= Dana@Online Knowledge´s last blog ..Appreciate The Blog Commentators =-.
Exactly! If you’re being a genuine commentator, you’ll end up promoting your blog better than if you’re just trying to promote. You can be both at once.
If you want to make a comment, but don’t really have anything insightful to say about the topic itself, sometimes just interacting with other commentators and replying to their comments can bait people to check out your site. I’ve noticed you particularly are good about talking with other commentators on John Chow’s site. I’d go read someone’s page if they replied to my comment!
Could these “To Make Noise” type of comments come from auto comment software?
Hmm. That does get me thinking… Good point.
I see these types of comments on posts very frequently (especially on super high traffic blogs like Problogger and Daily Blog Tips). Their user names don’t really have that “I’m a spammer/computer” vibe to them, but I guess an auto posting program can have any user name built in.
“Right” could mean so many things. I comment because I have a lot to say. I try limit myself to just a few sentences if I can.
At times, I actually leave comments even though I’m getting nothing in return, like when there’s no URL field. However, that’s not the norm. I don’t expect even exchanges but I believe in helping one another building blog communities.
I agree. Right is relative, but no matter what you define as right, there are definitely wrong reasons to comment too (which is what I was getting at).
I am also all for supporting other bloggers and building community just like you. I wouldn’t call it a comment exchange; however, you can bet if you comment on my blog regularly, I’ll try to hit up your blog too.
In fact, I visit each one of my top commentators blog’s daily to see what’s new regardless of the topic.
Initially when I started with blogging I used to comment in details like a post, later on after understanding the concept of backlinking I started commenting like “nice info” “thanks for sharing”. Later I realize how I’m hurting my brand and my own reputation. I was almost about to join the league of comment spammer , glad that I realize and come up with either comment to add value or else no comments .
Your story is exactly what this post is about. I think your new commenting policy is exactly how it should be.
If you’re shooting for a backlink, instead of just commenting “nice info,” read some of the comments and see if you can start some discussion based off someone’s comment. I like to try to answer questions or expand on someone’s point if I don’t have much to say about the posting topic.
Sometimes I want to comment, but realize, that to do so, would incite some brain dead individual to spout incoherent trash. If it is something that I am adament in my beliefs…I will write something, but most of the time, I just enjoy reading what others have to say.
Maureen, I’m so glad you take the time to comment here. There are a ton of people who “spout incoherent trash” which really bugs me. While you’re here, I want to hear what you have to say.
I also love that you comment about things you are passionate about. Getting in the conversation is so much more fun than watching imo ;-) Just remind me never to play poker with you.. People who sit and watch are always tricky!
Blake,
I often see the “comment drive-by” on my blog. “Hey looks great thanks see you later”. I am more amused by it than anything; it’s part of the game so I accept it. If you can add value to the converstation, comment. If not it’s best to read the article without putting your 2 cents in.
lol! I love that. Comment drive-by is exactly what it is.
I don’t mind having them either for the most part. What actually sparked this post was seeing about 10 of the comments on 3 major blogs in the same day.
I just want people to think about how sometimes their comments can be counterproductive or how they can drive extra traffic to their site if they provide great insight.
First of all Congratulation and lots of applause on writing this incredible article Blake.
Yes Blake, honestly speaking I also comment on the blog because of backlink and traffic but most of the time I made a genuine comments because I know the value of comments and how to draw a large amount of traffic from these genuine comments.
One more thing I want to say is most people comment on those topics which doesn’t belongs to their niche, i think this is useless, because it brings a backlink which is not good in terms of SEO. And it rarely brings traffic. Am I right Blake?
I’m not sure about the SEO aspect of having links in from unrelated sites. I’ve heard that it can hurt your page rank if you’re PR 4 or higher, but I don’t have any experience personally to confirm or deny that.
Traffic from sites outsite your niche is kind of an interesting topic, and I have a lot to say about it. I think in order to be a successful money making blog, you need to be able to attract interest from people in other niches (not easy).
Remember, most of your ads and affiliates are the same as other bloggers in your niche. Most people will buy from John Chow or Shoemoney before they buy from Props Blog.
If you are able to attract people from other niches and get them interested in your niche, you’ll have a whole new audience that other blogs in your niche don’t have.
In the short run, I don’t think pursing people from other niches is a good use of time because conversion is probably low, but if you already have a strong following, pulling people from other niches can take you to the next level.
What do you think?
i comment to build network with other fellow bloggers.
visit many blogs i like and i like commenting on post which i find interesting
Nice post :)
lol
[...] of what makes blogs such a unique communication tool. We’ve already discussed some of the reasons why people comment. Copyblogger also wrote about some of the pitfalls of using comments as a traffic building [...]
you are right.we should not give direct link in comment to our blog for just getting traffic