Comments – Do You Allow Backlinks with One Comment, Several Or None?

• Buffer

Comments and Backlinks – A Necessity or Evil?

(As you can see from the comment below)

 

Your Blog – Your Home – Your Rules

It is your blog right? You can set your boundries on your blog just like you do with your home. Why let someone who just comes once to your blog get a backlink especially if we don’t know them. If we haven’t met them on social media or anyplace else online or offline they are like a stranger. Why should they deserve an immediate backlink? It’s like the stores that offer rewards. They reward the customers that keep on coming back, not the first time in the door customers that may never return though they may offer other incentives for them.
Many bloggers recently have changed their backlinks from follow to nofollow. So what’s the value in that right? Blog comments may not have the same SEO link juice they once had. But that does not mean they have no value anymore.  I believe a three comment rule is fair. It is stated at the bottom of each post here:

“This blog uses premium CommentLuv which allows you to put your keywords with your name if you have had 3 approved comments. Use your real name and then @ your keywords (maximum of 3)”

Comments are crucial to many blogs survival. If we only blogged and did not engage with our readers how would we know what they are thinking or wanting from future posts? We know we can’t rely only on social media sites anymore to get our posts noticed or readers engaged. (Especially on Facebook today with their latest algorithm change).

Are Blog Comments Necessary Anymore?

If you missed Harleena’s post she did a fantastic job asking if blog comments are really required. Some top bloggers have closed off their comments altogether. I’m not sure that is really the answer but one can understand once one gets over 200 comments on each post. The time required to answer them must be gruesome. It will be interesting to see if their blogs will still thrive over time with closed comments. I believe if the content is great they will otherwise they will fail. Would you ever consider closing your blogs comments?

I’d love to know more about your comment approval policy and backlink policy.

Do YOU allow all or only after so many visits? Let’s discuss!

(Now after recording the video above several times I took time to learn how to make it widescreen but it did not look right so next time you will see a wider version video and maybe a tutorial on how to for YouTube.)

The Side Image courtesy of Boians Cho Joo Young / FreeDigitalPhotos.net