This post is a productivity tip for bloggers. I got inspired to writing it by reading Problogger Darren Rowse’s announcement of his 31 days to building a better blog – 2007 series. I know that a lot of my subscribers are fellow bloggers and a lot of you are interested in productivity as well. This tip is about Comment Marketing. Last week I read Yaro Starak‘s ebook “Blog Profits Blueprint”. The ebook is about three elements of a blog:
- Content
About what the pillars are for a blog, what attracts readers and converts them in subscribers. - Marketing
About how to tap into streams of traffic (for small blogs) and into rivers of traffic (later in the blog’s life). - Monetization
Well the book is about profit and the money needs to come from somewhere.
The practice of Comment Marketing
One of the items of marketing is Comment Marketing. Comment Marketing is the practice of bloggers leaving comments on posts of other blogs that add to the discussion of that post. Real comments that preferably add to the discussion. This is a win-win practice, where the blogger, the readers and you can win (so more of a win-win-win even). The blogger wins because he gets lively discussions in the comments section. Comments are an essential part of blogging, and a while back I read somewhere that “half the fun is in the comments”. The readers win because they are involved in a discussion on a topic that interests them, and if appropriate they are provided with further reading somewhere else (your blog). And finally you as a blogger win because you get some targeted traffic. To make comment marketing work best you need to follow the next steps:
- Leave a real comment that adds to the discussion of a post
- Follow-up on the comments a day or two days later if necessary
- Become a regular commenter on that blog
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Google Reader as a tracking tool
Google Reader provides an excellent way to track the articles you have commented on. All of the blogs I comment on are in my Reader, and all the articles I commented on get a star. This has several benefits:
- Articles commented on per blog
I can see per blog how many articles I have commented on and the timeline of my comments. If I click on the list view of a blog, I can see at a glance how many articles I have commented on. If I look at the dates I can also tell the time interval I have commented. Commenting on all articles is not recommended
You’re not stalking the blogger now are you? - Articles commented on per day
I can see how many comments I have left on all the blogs per day. If I select the starred items overview, the list view shows the dates the stars have been assigned. So if you do this consistently, you can tell how many articles you have commented on per day. - Revisit articles commented on recently
I can easily revisit blogs I have commented on. Using the starred items view, I can easily find all articles I have commented on in the last two days and revisit them to check-up on the discussion. Most blogs offer you an option to get new comments on an article emailed to you, but that can amount in vast numbers of email. I prefer to use Google Reader to revisit.
Adopting this is an easy routine, that will help you to get the most out of your comment marketing. But besides the marketing part, commenting is also a lot of fun, provides great opportunities to learn something and shows appreciation for the blogger who wrote the post. Commenting is good practice!
{ 26 comments… read them below or add one }
As a new blogger trying to settle into a groove, I found your simple suggesting very helpful. It is fun to leave comments and get to know others in the blogging community. But if you are hoping to make blogging a business, it is essential to use tips like this to streamline and track your activity.
I didn’t know Google Reader can do that. I’ll try the service for sure.
This is a great tip, as I’m currently tracking using the “Notify me of new comments by e-mail” box, but
(a) not all blogs have it, and
(b) sometimes the emails get a bit much.
I’m going to give this technique a try, and you’ll be my first “victim”… bwahaha
Seriously though, nice tip!
Thanks all for the comments! Glad to see it’s helpful to you guys.
@Paul: I used the same technique not too long ago. But one night I commented on 13 blogs, and consequently had 500+ e-mail the next day. That’s when I decided to find a better solution.
Useful, practical ideas – thanks!
In my niche of environmental blogging I’ve found this to be an effective approach.
One think I also do is follow technorati to monitor when other blogs link to my site, then I make a specific effort to comment on those posts as early as I can.
I find this to be more effective at driving traffic than when I just add a comment on some random blog — though I do that as well!
Thanks again for the great post.
-Kevin
http://www.21st-century-citizen.com
That’s also a great idea Kevin. I do follow the links from Technorati, but I have to admit that I’m not always commenting on them. But since they took the time to reward you with a link, a comment would be nice indeed.
Leaving comments on ‘random’ blogs is not what I’m advising
The blogs where I leave comments are related and I know the blogger or I intend to get to know them.
Thanks for this post… I found you through ProBlogger where my post on blogging tips
made it to the list
Tips #2 & 3: follow up on comments left on your blog with a comment of your own, and send a follow-up email to everyone who leaves a comment thanking them for doing so — which is exactly what Lodewijkvdb did!
And he earned himself an rss subscriber! I figure if he’s that good at working the process, he’s likely got a lot of other good ideas too!
Thanks again!
-kevin
My thoughts exactly, Kevin
Thanks guys! It’s good to have you around.
Excellent post on yet another way to do the other half of your job as a blogger. You’ve got my attention!
BTW, found you via http://problogger.net where we shared Darren’s first post list of tips.
Great post. I never really found a good use for the stars in good reader (until now). Only thing is, I try to minimize the amount of blogs in my reader, as it can get overwhelming. Sometimes I’ll find a post on some random blog that I was linked to, comment, and use the notify button. That’s just me though.
Your theme looks great btw. Did you do the modification of YGo Loner by yourself?
Hi Alex.
Yes, I did all the modification myself. That was quite a lesson in CSS, I can tell you
For Google Reader, you could also work with folders. One folder for the blogs you read, and one for the others. But you should definitely stick to what works for you. I’ve been using the stars like this for a while now and it really works for me.
You left me wondering though in what category my (some random?) blog is
Oh I don’t use random folders Lodewijkvdb – they’re all very detailed
Hi Lodewijkvdb
Just a quick update, I’ve been using your tip for a few days now, and I must admit it’s been great! That’s actually how I remembered I’d posted on this thread… because of the star
Plus, I was using FeedReader on my desktop, but now I’m moving over to Google Reader because I think it’s just easier managing all the feed’s I’m subscribed to online. Plus the star thing
Thanks again!
Thanks Paul. I appreciate it very much that you took the time to come back again to share that
Wow, this is a great little system to use. I just tried it out and think its great. Thanks for the tip.
I started using Reader a few months ago to keep track of blog posts that I want to come back to and possibly write about, and I use stars for that. My goal is to always keep the starred category empty, but it doesn’t always work that way.
What I’ve found works well for me is to use the CoComment extension for Firefox. It lets me track comments I leave and from their site I can see which topics have had follow ups posted.
Ryan » That’s a cool tip Ryan. Just signed up, will definitely test CoComments during the next couple of days.
Dude!!! Great idea!!! You totally rock. I liked it so much…I used it. Guess I’m not an original, after all…
Nice tip. I use google reader too, and was looking for a way to remember which blogs I had made comments on recently- duh the star! thanks
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hi,
This article is very useful especially for new bloggers like me. for some times i found it difficult to read my own comments on my blogs. but now with google reader it has become easier.
John
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PIMShell can enable you to view and post comments directly in Google Reader. And your posted comments will be saved automatically. PIMShell also provides firefox add-on.
I was thinking that a comment that you post to a blog (and any subsequent posts by others) would appear in that blogs feed? But I am not seeing that this is the case normally. This would seem to be a wasted opportunity of RSS?
Have a Chrome extension: Original Comments for Google Reader.
Directly view original comments in Google Reader. You can also subscribe to comments. If there are some new comments, program will fetch them automatically.
I am going to have a look at this now! Thanks
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