We all know the importance of Comments. One of the basic advices that most bloggers give is to regularly comment on other blogs. It helps to build links to your blog as well as bring traffic. But one thing most bloggers out there do not know is it helps to market your blog too.
Those of you who see bringing in traffic and marketing as same, clearly have very little idea about marketing. To understand how to market your blog, you need to understand the true meaning of marketing. Marketing is the art of building relationship with your customer (for a blog reader) and creating an identity or brand. Getting traffic is the after effect of marketing.
4 Ways How To Market Your Blog With Comments
There are quite a few of different ways of marketing your blog and commenting being one of the easiest and less time taking method. Commenting is a very easy task and every human being has the urge to comment (give advice /criticize) at some point of time. Commenting as marketing method is quite effective. As I told you marketing is to build relationship and identity, so you should remember some basic points while using comments to market you blog.
Use your Own Name/Blog Name while commenting. You have two options here, either you can market you name or the blog name. Use a blog name only if it is unique and not generic. For example if you have blog called web traffic blog, I would advice to use your name instead. Web Traffic Blog is so general. But the choice is yours. Whatever name you use it on every blog that you leave comment. Be consistent with the name.- Use your best email. By best email I mean one of the emails that you use it daily. It would be better to use an email which has either your name/blog name in it. DON’T worry about sharing this email, no one is going to spam you.
- Link to a Landing Page. When you comment on a blog you are allowed to leave your website URL in it. Most of us use our blog URL. I would advice you to use a Landing Page instead. By landing page I do not mean a sales page. You need to create a new page in your blog specially built to market you blog. It can be welcome page where you tell about yourself, your blog and provide some info. You can also add you Feeds link or Newsletter form in it.
- Comment Properly. This the most important point. Read the post you are commenting on carefully. At least use 4-5 lines while commenting. Provide a quality comment.
The points above will help you build an identity of yours in the blog that you left a comment. Now you also need to build a relationship and make your identity stronger. For this your comment need to be catchy and useful. Here are some tips which will help you leave a better comment on any blog.
- If you know the blog niche quite well share your insights.
- If you do not agree with a point on a blog, counterattack the point.
- If you agree with a point, show your support and add something to it.
- If you do not understand something, ask counter questions.
- If you have nothing to say, wait for few comment to come in and then comment using their ideas a little.
I hope with all the above points in your mind you can market you blog very well with comments.
PS: If you are trying to build links through comments some of the above tips will be disadvantageous. So use the tips above only if you wish to market you blog.
About Author :
This is a guest post from Agent Deepak. Agent Deepak is the author of AgentDeepak, he writes about blogging and marketing related articles. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook.
About Lee Ka Hoong
These points are all important but for me the most important is point 4 – provide a quality comment. Add some advice or extra tip etc. I hate those that just say ‘great post’ or ‘thanks’. I started to delete those types of comments from my blog because they are not adding any value.
One other little bit of advice – make sure you have an avatar i.e. picture. I think it makes so much difference when you can see a picture of the person commenting.
Andrew
.-= Andrew @ blogging guide´s last blog ..Do NOT upgrade to WordPress 2.9 yet… =-.
You are absolutely correct a good avatar makes a difference. thanks for adding the point. I somehow completely forgot to mention it.
.-= Agent Deepak´s last blog ..Do not write a Quality Post each and every Time =-.
comment can be everthing. So, we need to use our comment for many thing and being honest is the best thing at our comment.
.-= titan´s last blog ..Why I still use Streamyx? =-.
Hi Lee! I’m still learning the skill of commenting. In my opinion, i prefer to comment just follow what i want to say out for that particular article without thinking of marketing my blog so much. I wish to give a sincere comment rather than just wish to market our own blog. I don’t like to do that. Thanks for sharing ya!
.-= Kok Siong Chen´s last blog ..Autosomal Aneuploidy – Cytogenetic Abnormalities =-.
Exactly! Any comment I leave on a blog is always first and foremost a sincere one. Commenting can indeed help market your own blog but I do skip commenting if I feel I can not give any added value to the post in question.
Point number 3 above: ‘Link to a landing page’ sometimes doesn’t work in all blogs. Some blogs’ comment section rejects any url besides the main page e.g. ‘http://domainname.tld/‘ is okay, but ‘http://domainname.tld/a-page-or-post/‘ is rejected. In blogs however with CommentLuv, this is put to maximum use.
.-= James M.´s last blog ..Bugs Bunny Poster =-.
Kok I understand all your feeling as commentator but you need not think about marketing while commenting. If you are good at commenting you will be marketing yourself.
.-= Agent Deepak´s last blog ..Do not write a Quality Post each and every Time =-.
Landing page for a blog is new idea for me. It seems great idea tough so i will try it.
.-= Dana @ LetUpdate´s last blog ..Re-Brand The Blog =-.
Agree! And yes, we have to make sure that the comment is worth to read and gives benefits to the others so the others would like to know more about you and visit your site.
.-= BloggerDaily´s last blog ..Upgrading WordPress – Should I? =-.
I often link to home page. Linking to Landing pageis good idea so i will try it :D
.-= Minh@Minh Meo’s Blog´s last blog ..Hướng dẫn đăng kí x10hosting – Hosting miễn phí tốt nhất =-.
I think it is better to link back to blog homepage because blog owner tend to check what their commentators have. Besides it is easy and useful!
Lee you have mentioned some nice point. Here I want to share one opinion that I am optimizing my blog for keyword “work at home jobs” and I want to optimize my one or two blog post that I write on work at home, I have written on different niche like blogging, SEO, link building. SO if I use my home page when commenting I think I do not get much credit of my specific keyword optimization.
So what you think about it, will it be good?
.-= chandan@work at home´s last blog ..Work at home | Freelancing PDF converting job =-.
Some nice tips. Your point about the landing page has got me thinking hard and long on this side. I might do that from next year. I know some webmasters don’t like that, but others don’t mind. I guess we will have to test the waters so to speak.
.-= George Serradinho´s last blog ..eBook – Delicious Candy Recipes =-.
Most will not mind it. But remember do make your landing page look like a sales page. It should made solely to tell readers about you, about your blog, your work (popular blog post etc) and how they can keep contact with you (your social profiles + RSS link)
.-= Agent Deepak´s last blog ..Do not write a Quality Post each and every Time =-.
Excellent tips. I especially like #3; been meaning to do that myself for a while actually, so thanks for the reminder.
As for #1, perhaps you should amend it to say, your name or your name @ blog name. Lots of blog admins like myself are really starting to put the smack-down on pure keywords in the name field.
.-= Dennis Edell´s last blog ..The $10 Winner And More Good News….. =-.
Your Name @ Blog Name is good idea. I do not have any experience using it.
.-= Agent Deepak´s last blog ..Do not write a Quality Post each and every Time =-.