Having said that, I would like to share this “gem” I got today on one of my blogs. I am sure most of you recognize it:

“Intimately, the actual article is really the finest on this significant topic. We agree along with your conclusions and may eagerly appear forward to your following improvements. Simply saying many thanks won’t you sufficient, for the actual exceptional lucidity in your writing. may instantly get your own give food to to stay abreast associated with any updates. Genuine perform and much achievement in your own efforts!

Yahoo Babelfish anyone?
.-= Daisy´s last blog ..The Pros and Cons of Yoga =-.

Rochelle

So, I am now turning off the “Comment” feature on these sites. What a shame that one or two people have ruined it for honest commenters. But, I’m tired of the huge addition to spam in my inbox.

From what I can tell, it is only the sites that use KeywordLuv and CommentLuv. So, I will never use those plugins again!

Rochelle

I just got 3 of those type of comments today … praising me for writing such useful content, and promising to bookmark my site and subscribe to my feed. I sent all three to akismet land.

I think one of the biggest problems when it comes to commenting is this idea that it’s primarily a way to get backlinks … it’s not nearly the “best” way to get links.

But … it is one of the best ways to network and get to know other bloggers … something that too many people who go on “link building” comment runs tend to forget. 3 or 4 new friends (especially friends with successful blogs) can be way more valuable over the long run, than even 5 or 6 hundred comments. (IMHO)
.-= Todd Morris´s last blog ..How To Organize Google Reader For Peak Productivity =-.

Yes there are a plethora of programs available to use that can automate (or semi-automate) blog commenting.

To be honest, I use several of these myself. But NOT for the purposes of spam commenting, but rather as a quick way to read content and then quickly leave a useful comment on it without having to go through dozens and dozens of blogs.

Instead I just load up a program and do it from one central location. Quite convenient I must say.
.-= Tyler – Niche Store Journey´s last blog ..Driving Traffic Using Blog Commenting =-.

Thanks for shedding light on scripts for spam commenting. I figured it was something like that.

I have a method of finding .gov and .edu blogs for leaving comments, as those are really great backlinks. I plan on writing a post soon about how to do that. Google really loves to see those type of backlinks.

Great tip, too, about finding sites that use the Top Commentator plugin to get the most out of your blog commenting efforts.

Rochelle

I know someone that tested a piece of software that does the automated commenting. He just wanted to see how many links he could build as a test. It worked pretty well for a short time. Then he forgot to use a proxy and a blog marked him as spam. Once that happens every WordPress blog that uses the spam plugin will automatically mark that IP address as spam and the author will never see the comment. You can get your IP address out of the “spam box”. You just have to know how to do it.

For a short time I worked as an intern for a major SEO blogger. He taught me a lot about building back links. Commenting on relevant blogs was one of those. I used to stay up until 1 or 2 (and then had to get up at 6 to go to my real job) in the morning reading articles and putting relevant comments up. I never used the same comment twice and I read every single article I commented on. In the 3 months I did that I had built over 15,000 back links. I did not comment on 15,000 blog posts. I took advantage of blogs using commentluv and the top commenter plugin. If you can find high pagerank blogs that use the top commenter plugin you can build a lot of back links very quickly. Just be careful not to go crazy doing it. Some site owners do not like to see you listed as the only person commenting. But in moderation it works well. The site I was working on actually got penalized by Google for building back links too quickly. They thought I was using some type of automation software to do it. But I wasn’t…I was just never sleeping

I actually kind of enjoyed commenting. Believe it or not there are a lot of websites with some very good information. I was learning a lot and enjoying leaving thoughtful comments. Commenting is a really good way to build back links. But as Rochelle and Tyler say, keep the comments relevant. And actually read the posts. You will be surprised how much you can learn from everyone else.

@Mick – What also annoys me is when it seems a commenter targets one of my sites and bombards it with gobbledy-gook comments at regular intervals. When this happens it goes on for days. The person doing it uses a huge variety of IP addresses, so I can’t ban it. But, I also don’t approve it. Makes me think it is an automated system being used, because I can’t imagine someone would waste that much time for comments that never get published.

@Julie – Maybe we should write blog posts along the lines of, “This Is The Best Blog On The Internet, Come And Gush Over How Great It Is”

Actually, I find I have very few spam comments on this blog. There was the one I mentioned on my daughter’s health update, and a few others that tell me what a fabulous blog this is, but really, I don’t have to delete much at all (I’m knocking on wood, now, just in case I jinxed myself).

Rochelle