In the world of blogging, you have got to learn to reciprocate for other people. If you are going to make it, I strongly feel that you have to give back to the community as a whole. I look at it like Karma. The more you give, the more you get back.
You will see on my blog that I am constantly talking about how other bloggers ought to reconsider making sure that their blog comments follow. Using the No Follow tag is one of the least effective ways to combat spam. You are far better off using a spam tool like Akismet.
Making your blog comments follow is one easy way you can give back to those people who are participating actively in the things you are trying to do with your website.
When I visit other people’s blogs and leave comments, I am an active user of the Share This button. If I like your post enough to leave a comment on it, then I probably like it enough to want to share it with the rest of the world. I do this by using the tools at hand. I bookmark it for other people and the search engines to find. That way it gives you a little more publicity for doing a good job. Isn’t this how the net is supposed to operate anyway?
When I read the comments left at someone else’s site and there is a less informed person trying to offer advice to people, I will politely try to correct them so that the information people are getting is more on target. There are a lot of times when you will read something that you know is simply false. In those situations you are helping everyone else out by setting them straight.
If I see someone trying to get a particular post to rank well for a long tail keyword and that person has helped me in some way in the past, I have no problem at all throwing a little link love their way to help them out. If it helps them earn a couple bucks, then great.
You shouldn’t be overly selfish in this particular world. There are far more benefits in being generous with what you do online. As long as you aren’t helping out the hardcore spammers, then it isn’t going to negatively impact you at all. Instead, you end up making friends who are there to help you when you really need it.
Share the love online. There is no reason not to.
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Very good point. I became a dofollow blog in 2008 because, until that time, I’d never heard of the concept. There are those who write these articles about how to sculpt your site to attain the best PR, but really, what’s the sense of that if you don’t have any visitors or anyone wanting to comment on your blog in the first place?
I agree Mitch. Great minds think alike. Although the PR is nice so that you know it is helping other people when you link to them.
Unfortunately, my PR was taken away, but I don’t care because I rank well in other ways and I’m still often found through the search engines.
Mitch,
Do you know why your PR was taken away? Were you teaching black hat or recommending people use questionable tactics?
Mines always been a dofollow blog and while that encourages more spam Akismet get’s the bulk of it and I don’t mind spamming the rest.
I’m also a firm believer in helping other bloggers where I can. That may be by writing a helpful post or answering a query, it’s all good as long as another person has been enriched in a small way.
I like your blog Sire.
I am far more likely to leave a comment and bookmark a post with my conglomerate of social bookmark accounts if that blog is dofollow. I just prefer to reward people who help others. If you were willing to love me a little. I am happy to give a little love back. Don’t you just feel all warm and cozy now?
Don’t be flirting with Sire; now he’ll never leave lol
Oops!
I changed my blog to do follow a while back. I’ve only been doing this for a few months so traffic is really low and changing it to do follow didn’t really affect anything – but I never really understood why people wouldn’t want to help out other bloggers with that.
Sharing posts on stumbleupon, Digg etc. is huge! I also find myself looking at ads a lot more than I ever did before. If there’s an ad for something interesting on a blog, I’ll definitely click to check it out knowing that the blog owner is a little happier as I do. Before blogging, I would have either ignored it all together or searched Google for the words in the ad to see what the product was.
Curtis,
If your blog is dofollow and you want more comments along with the traffic, then you should submit your blog to some dofollow lists so other people find out about it. People will find it eventually on their own and tell others about it, but it will take a lot (lot) longer.
I’m a stay-at-home mom who recently launched a site (in-between diaper changes). I worked on it nights and nights in a row and I appreciate the help from people like you who “give a little love back”:)