Today, Ari at AriWriter wrote about closing or moderating blog comments in response to another blogger who is closing comments on posts after two weeks.
Reasons I Keep Comments Open
While I can understand why closing comments on older posts is a good idea due to all of the heavy spamming that goes on (I have considered doing it myself from time to time) ultimately I think that commenting should stay open for the following reasons.
Encouraging Comments
One major goal as a blogger is to receive comments on their posts. The last thing you want to do is to have a first time visitor to your site come in on an old post, get really excited about responding to it, just to find the comments are off. Assuming they are not the ultra determined type to go seeking out your comment form or other contact information, they may just leave and you will not get the chance to interact with them and possibly convert them into a loyal reader.
This year has been a great one for Kikolani in terms of choosing a focus on blogging and social media, and then sticking with it. The following is a compilation of the best blogging articles on Kikolani for 2009.
Benefits of Blogging
On December 1, 2009, the new FTC guidelines concerning product endorsements and testimonials goes into effect. For bloggers and social media users, it means that if you are promoting a product, you have to make it clear if you are receiving any financial gain (or “material connections”) for said promotion.
As I understand it, this includes if a advertiser pays you writing a review, gives you a free product to try in exchange for the review, or gives you commission when someone purchases the product after clicking on a link to it from your website.
It also affects the types of testimonials you can have about products. No more “results are not typical” testimonials that include how someone made millions just by following a strategy or lost a boatload of pounds in just months by taking a diet pill. The testimonials have to be about the average results.
Bloggers tend to face challenges in the path to becoming a successful blogger which may make them think they should give up. Here are some of those common roadblocks in the blogging path, and a few suggestions on how to get past them.
1. Your blog lost or has never gained PageRank
PageRank is not a determining factor in whether or not your blog is valuable. PageRank is simply Google’s analysis of your site based on an unpredictably changing algorithm.
Remember that most readers do not care about your PageRank. Quality writing comes from sites ranked anywhere on the Google scale. PageRank does not necessarily affect your position in SERPs (search engine result pages). This means that sites with a 0 ranking could still be in the first 10 results for a given keyword or phrase.
If you’re concerned about your PageRank, maybe you should devote some time to reading the Google Webmaster Guidelines and Search Optimization Starter Guide to make sure you are following their rules.
If your site is suffering from low PageRank and missing from search engine results, it may be time to review the above mentioned Google guidelines and ask them to reconsider your site.
For most of my readers, the holiday season is about to go into full swing, starting tomorrow with Thanksgiving. Tis the season of four day weekends, or even full weeks off of full time jobs, depending on what you do for a living.
Is Closing Blog Comments a Good Idea?
by Kristi Hines on December 17, 2009 · 49 comments
Today, Ari at AriWriter wrote about closing or moderating blog comments in response to another blogger who is closing comments on posts after two weeks.
Reasons I Keep Comments Open
While I can understand why closing comments on older posts is a good idea due to all of the heavy spamming that goes on (I have considered doing it myself from time to time) ultimately I think that commenting should stay open for the following reasons.
Encouraging Comments
One major goal as a blogger is to receive comments on their posts. The last thing you want to do is to have a first time visitor to your site come in on an old post, get really excited about responding to it, just to find the comments are off. Assuming they are not the ultra determined type to go seeking out your comment form or other contact information, they may just leave and you will not get the chance to interact with them and possibly convert them into a loyal reader.
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