Author: Kaushal Gandhi

Kaushal's Author Bio:

Blog Commenting – Making the Most Out of It

18 Replies Kaushal Gandhi

Since sites that are rich with relevant inbound links are rated favourably by search engines, link building is of vital importance in SEO.

By virtue of its ease, commenting on blogs has become a convenient and popular tactic for link building. Regularly scanning blogs by experts, reading news posts and adding comments that link back to the commenter’s website, seems be the quickest way out.

However blog commenting offers many more benefits; and you should aim to get much more returns from your comments. Here are some simple tips help you achieve this.

Technology Bloggers comment form

Showcase your awareness

Promoting yourself needn’t be equated with dramatic sales talk. In fact using blog commenting space for sales promotion is taboo.

On the other hand, simply adding a line of appreciation just to earn a link is not the right way either. Rather, invest some time in reading and comprehending the entire post and only then adding an insightful comment – comprising a minimum of three sentences – to enrich the conversation.

In this manner, blog commenting offers a good platform to showcase your awareness and experience and thus grow your brand.

Engage with the blogger

Some blogs make for extremely insightful and enjoyable reading. Why not try and develop a connect with those bloggers?

Following them on Twitter and other social media increases the exposure of their writings. Once they see you enriching the quality of their blog with well-thought of comments, they will be attracted to read and endorse your blog too.

Foster relations with the community

It’s quite likely that visitors of a particular blog, where you regularly submit comments on aren’t reading your blog as yet. The good news is that commenting on blogs is a great way to share your experiences and opinions, and establish yourself amongst a completely new set of readers.

Further, if you are a regular contributor of interesting and relevant comments, it could mean more opportunities for your blog. Replying directly to the comments of blog readers and initiating a conversation or debate on a specific subject, is great way to be recognized too. Replying to the first 4-5 comments enhances visibility within the community.

Finally, remember to be proactive on your blog too. While there aren’t many SEO advantages, blog commenting is a great tool for networking and building brand awareness.

Monitor your blog on a daily basis; always allow comments on your blog; and be sure to reply to those who have queries after reading your posts.

Do note that a lot of individuals commenting on blogs are bloggers too and there are benefits to be gained from having a good reputation among your peers.

12 useful WordPress plugins – 2011

19 Replies Kaushal Gandhi

WordPress is very popular among bloggers and writers today. One of the reasons is because it offers many of plugins that can help make your blog even better!

WordPress PluginsThere are an almost endless number of plugins you can find on WordPress, but it is important to limit your use to a few, as too many plugins can have an adverse effect on your host. The question is, which ones should you use?

Here are some options that can certainly be useful:-

1) Google XML- Sitemaps

This helps search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Ask to index your blog and informs them when you add new posts. These maps also help users to browse well through your various posts and find what they are looking for.

2) DiggDigg

Through this plugin you can insert buttons of various social networking sites on your WordPress site like Facebook like, Facebook share, Twitter, Digg, LinkedIn and many others.

3) Insights

Insights help you add more information to your blog. You can insert Flickr images, YouTube videos and interlink various posts to your advantage.

4) WP Super Cache

WP Super Cache converts WordPress PHP scripts into html files, thus reducing load and down time.

5) WP-DBManager

This plugin helps you manage your blog by providing ways to repair, backup, restore, and optimize database.

6) Akismet

Akismet helps you keep a check on spam by checking your blog comments and submitting to your admin such comments for review.

7) YoastWordPress SEO

This SEO plugin helps bloggers in optimising page titles and keywords into XML sitemaps.

8) Contact Form 7

Through Contact Form 7, users can create, manage and customize contact forms on their blog.

9) LinkWithin

This plugin adds thumbnails of relevant posts on your blog.

10) Yet Another Related Post Plugin (YARPP)

YARPP provides information of pages and posts which are related to your new entry thus giving the reader a chance to read more matter on the topic.

11) WP Page Navi

It helps in navigating through the site and provides the various posts with page numbers.

12) Google Analytics Plugin

Google Analytics is a good tool to track your blog and thus access information like outbound clicks, page views, and other metadata.

Whether you are a leisure blogger or a blogger for money, it is important to be familiar with and equip yourself with necessary plugins, as these can make your thought-sharing experience easier and more convenient.

So continue sharing relevant information and happy blogging!