Over the next week or so, we've got a short series of blogs for you, all on the subject of commenting on blogs.
Why comment on blogs?
1. It promotes interaction and engagement.
This first point is particularly important if you have a blog of your own.
If you do, you know how gratifying it is to receive an interesting comment on a post, whether it is as simple as 'nice post' or as detailed as someone questioning a part of your argument.
For that reason, posting a comment generates a lot of good will (as long as it is not negative - more on that in part 3), and will make an author likely to be interested in you and your business.
After all, we all want to know that our blogs are being read - a comment is instant confirmation of that.
You can start to build relationships by regularly visiting and commenting on blogs which are relevant to your area of expertise.
Someone you have engaged with via their blog will be more likely to respond to other things you say, whether that is on your blog or on Facebook or Twitter.
2. It generates awareness.
Commenting on high profile blogs can bring you to the attention of your peers.
Even busy bloggers read their comments, and are likely to look at a commenter and see who they are by following a link through to their website.
If you make the effort to regularly engage, you will start to stand out particularly if there is a crowd of others commenting.
In this way, commenting on someone else's blog, perhaps someone you admire in your particular area of business, could lead to them and their readers becoming aware of you and your business, especially if you follow our advice in the next point.
3. It creates links.
When you comment on a blog, you are typically allowed to leave a url associated with your name.
This could be your blog if you have one, your website, or even your Twitter of Facebook profile - anything that means someone who reads your comment can find out more about you.
This is very important for ensuring the two points above work as effectively as possible, but it is also a way of building links to your website and thus helping its positions in organic search results.
Google and other search engine have always rewarded sites that draw in natural links from a variety of sources, but the recent news that Google and Bing are directly taking social interaction and engagement into account when putting together search results means that these kinds of methods of engagement are only going to get more important.
So next time you read a blog post you like, or raises questions for you, don't just internalise your response, remember that your comment can be a useful marketing tool!
