Comment Your Way To The Top
Leaving comments on other people’s blog is a good way to not only get the blog owners to notice you (and maybe comment on your blog), it can also be a good source of traffic because blog readers will notice you as well.
You don’t have be as prolific as some of the top commentators who comment on my blog but being part of a blog community brings many advantages. Here are a few ways to get maximum benefit out of commenting on other blogs.
Be The First To Comment
If you’re after traffic, then be the first to comment. Blog readers rarely read comments after the first ten so the chance of you receiving any traffic benefit if your comment is near the bottom is very slim.
I remember telling Ed Lau of EdEdition.com to be the first to comment on Digg stories that matched his blog posts. Ed would sneak in a link to his related post in the comments of a front page Digg story and the resulting traffic was better than if he had submitted a Digg story that didn’t make the front page.
Here’s another example. My friend Carl Nelson got a front page Digg to his tech site and someone made a comment that his RSS button was very big. I made a reply that said, “That’s not a big RSS button. THIS is a big RSS button!†That reply sent almost 500 Digg readers to check out the button.
Go After The Big Blogs
Technorati has a list of the top 100 blogs on the Net. These blogs get a ton of traffic and they all have comment systems. The key is not to spam those blogs with a ton of comments. All you need is to be among the first 10 or so to make a comment to the latest post. It’s best to go after big blogs with topics that are related to yours. Make a nice thought provoking comment and there’s a good chance readers will check out your blog.
Look For Blogs With Top Commentators List
If you’re going to be active in a blog, you should be rewarded for it. After all, you are helping to drive traffic and keep the blog active.
The top commentators list is the way I reward bloggers for helping to maintain an active community. This WordPress plugin lists the commentators with the highest comment count over the past ten days (it can be set for whatever time period you like). The link does not have a nofollow tag so the commentators gets full SEO benefit as well.
When commenting on a blog with a top commentators list, you may not want to use your name. Instead, you may want to use a keyword that you want to target and rank for. Chances are, you’re already number 1 on Google for your name so target another keyword. Getting on a top commentators list can bring you some nice targeted traffic but the SEO benefits is generally greater. Along the same SEO line, you can look for blogs that have removed nofollow from their comment system. You can find a list of “DoFollow” blogs at FollowList.com.