Getting rid of the spam in your blog comments

Getting rid of the spam in your blog comments

Receiving a comment on your blog is wonderful — it reaffirms that someone, somewhere out there is reading your ramblings. And very often it’s the start of a community, all centred around your blog. What’s not to like?

Well, not all comments are good comments. Spammers have become very clever at singling out bloggers, writing complimentary comments and then putting a dodgy web address in the URL field. The trouble is, that because many new bloggers don’t know what to look for, those comments sit there, undermining your credibility and tricking unsuspecting readers into visiting all manner of websites they might not normally frequent!

So how do you spot a spammy comment?

Well I have to say rule number one for me is to install Akismet if you’re on WordPress. That screens out all of my spammy comments and in almost 1,000 legitimate comments, I haven’t had a spammy one. If you’re not sure how, ask your developer to do it for you (we install as standard when we set up a blog).

Secondly, think “do I know this person?” If not, I always trace the link back to their site — purely to be nosey (and also to say thank you!). You’ll soon know whether it’s a site you’re happy for your business to be associated with or not.

Thirdly, click on the links in their comment and be sure you’re happy with them. And that’s it – very simple.

So tell me, do you have problems with spammy comments on your blog? And if so, how do you deal with them?

Fiona Humberstone is an expert contributor to Marketing Donut and managing director of Flourish.

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