Website Promotion – Blog Commenting Part 1

In light of yesterday's post and as a continuation of the website promotion series, today I will talk about blog commenting as another great way to promote your new blog or store.

After submitting the RSS feed using the list of 102 Best RSS directories, the next step I take is to begin commenting on other blogs.

Of course, blog commenting is not new, but there is a right way and wrong way to go about it. I've seen so much bad advice regarding using this method that it makes me sick. So I am going to share with you my exact strategy of using this tactic. It is what works for me and hopefully, you will be able to walk away with a few tips for yourself.

The biggest mistake that I see people make is that they will just go out and blindly search for blogs in their niche and then comment on every one of them. This can work against you in many, many ways. Think about this for just a second. If you have already submitted your RSS feed and your blog to the directories I've recommended, you have completed your first campaign of up to 100 or more backlinks. If you immediately go out and comment on a hundred or five hundred plus blogs in your niche, do you really think this is going to look "natural" to Google or any other search engine? Of course not. Especially not with a brand new site.

Give those first backlinks a chance to get indexed and go to work for you for a few weeks. You do not want to build too many backlinks all at once. This is the voice of experience speaking, it will not work in your favor.

Simply put, what we are looking for at this point is traffic. And when done properly, blog commenting is truly one of the more powerful ways to get it.

What you want to do now is go out and find anywhere from 5-15 very popular, high traffic blogs in your niche that you can follow and comment on regularly. By popular and high traffic, I mean ones that are updated frequently and appear to have a steady following. By regularly, I mean ones that you will return to on at least a weekly basis and participate in a discussion or two. In essence, you are going to become a part of the community on these blogs - much like a forum. This is going to require some research.

There are several ways you can find blogs in your niche. One of the first places I look is Google Blog Search. Just type in your niche, hit the search blogs button and it will bring up results of many blogs and posts related to your field. You may have to broaden your search terms if your niche is a tightly narrowed one.

Now begin visiting some of these sites. Here are a few things you are looking for:

• Blogs that have at least two to three new posts each week
• Blogs that have at least a few comments on most every post - some by the same commentors as this indicates it has a following.
• Does it display the amount of RSS subscribers anywhere on the blog? If so, aim for blogs with as high a number as possible. Sometimes many people follow a blog, but never make a comment. This can work in your favor.

Do not let pagerank or the nofollow attribute influence you here as these items do not matter in what we are trying to accomplish here. You are looking for quality blogs in your niche which offer good information and that you feel comfortable following.

When you have found the first five, go find two or three posts on each that you can contribute to. By contribute, I mean offer something of quality to the discussion. Do you agree with what they are saying? If you do, say so as well as why. Do you disagree? Say so and tell them why. Do you have something you can add to what the author or another commentor said? Tell them. Again, you are going to be following this blog and commenting regularly so add quality comments to the discussion.

This is the point where you will start to see traffic. Your first visit will more than likely be from the blog authors and once your comment is approved, the community will become curious about you and begin visiting. The more you comment and participate, the more likely the visitors are to keep coming. Especially if you offer something of value on your own site.

Some authors will like what they see so much they will link to you in their blogroll. This happens often with the visitors in the community as well. It also gives you the ability to build some strong relationships in the niche. If you were ever to develop your own product, such as an ebook, you will already have people you can either give review copies to or who would be willing to promote it. This is POWERFUL for you.

One thing I do want to stress here - when you begin doing this, DO NOT link to your website in the text of your comment. The author more than likely will not approve your comment. For now, it is good enough to drop the link in the comment form where it asks for your website. The only time you should ever link to your site in the actual comment itself is if you might have a post on your site that may compliment the article you are commenting on. But you only want to do this once you have established yourself in the community.

If you use this method when you first begin commenting, you will be surprised at how quickly you will gain visitors as well as customers. You will also be gaining backlinks.

This is the end of Blog Commenting Part 1. Stay tuned for Part 2. In the meantime, enjoy this cute cartoon.