A couple of weeks ago I wrote a review post about Comment Luv premium and I received a question in the comments that I thought would make an excellent topic for this week’s blogging debate.
Here is the question that was posed by Rebecca Watkins
I am the first to admit that i am not an SEO expert so I am very interested in hearing both sides of this argument as well. My thoughts are that do follow links will probably leak a little juice from your site and may effect page rank. The reality for me is that I really do not care about page rank that much. I have had page rank of 4 on this blog in the past and now i have page rank 2. The traffic that I receive from Google has never been higher. Plus, I would rather have a blog with comments and engagement than having a high page rank.
Your turn – What side of this debate are you on?
I am on your side of the debate. I’d rather have a blog that has an active community and discussion than mere PR. Let Google keep juggling with the link juice and PR.
For a blogger, there could be nothing more satisfying that having 20 interactive comments on his post.
Yeah Don, I totally agree with you! That links can be bad or good, but only thing what you really need to watch does that website breaking Google rules.
Hi Dan, an engaging blog will capture increased traffic and comments. If the flow of stories and posts keep me interested over time I like to participate. Thus, an exchange of do-follow links for a nominal number of comments or, a re-tweet; G+ or Like seems reasonable.
I don’t think so! And I hardly think about my sites page rank because traffic of the website matters to me.
Do follow is good but upto an extent but Yes dofollow blog spread your PR juice to other blog.
It’s really hard to jump start a community around your blog and incentivizing comments is one way to do it. I don’t think there is any harm in it, but you do have to make sure you’re not linking out to junk.
I generally agree with most of the comments on here. Allowing ‘Do Follow’ comments can leak a bit of PageRank as result, however, it isn’t going to make a significant enough change your overall authority and PageRank.
Why people choose ‘Do follow’ blog comments is to encourage community and discussion on their blog, and rather a commentator getting nothing in return (i.e. a no followed link) you are rewarding them will them a followed link instead.
I think it is a good idea for some blogs, as a blogger myself you love it when people comment and the more comments you get the bigger audience you’ll end up attracting to the blog.
With anything in digital, there are always pros and cons to making the decision, in this case I think there are more pros then cons.
Great blog BTW the Dan!
you want to know the negative effect of the do follow comments on the seo and pank rank point of view…….
so negative effect does not take place in case seo and page rank……….
I remember reading somewhere that you can lose your ranking if you consistently link to low-quality websites, or if a lot of low-quality websites link to your website, but I can’t cite my sources. For example, if you used article spinner and automatic article submitter that only submits your article to low quality websites, Search engines can figure that out. But allowing dofollow comments is fine from the pint of view of SEO, and it’s EXCELLENT from the point of view of engaging your readers and building community.
You should use keywords that are in line with what is on your website so Google will rank it with higher relevancy. Don’t just repeat the keywords over and over in each field but get a list of related keywords which will fit in with your website or blog. For name, you can use the name or title label of your site.
Its better to go with dofollow but if you choose no ranking in seo and page rank, its not required.
“Your blogs commenting section helps you bring a community feel to your business, and allows others to feel and see that they are not alone in seeking your advice”. I strongly agree on this, through blog commenting, discussions and queries are open..Our misconceptions on one’s idea will be corrected and answered..It can build relationships towards the author and the readers and the commenter.
I’ve always thought the potential drawback in leaking link juice is pretty overrated compared to the increased engagement you can get from giving people a “perk” for commenting.
I would think that in general Google would rather see a blog post with lots of comments and engagement that pointed to a variety of good sites, rather than a blog post that’s locked down and doesn’t get much conversation. Then again I don’t work for the Big G, so maybe I’m giving them too much credit
interesting post but i dont think do follow blog comments give negative effect on SEO although for me it became beatifically as few of my keyword ranked well in Google and started giving me good traffic so for me do follow blog commenting is really good (practically)
dofollow blogs are offering those backlinks that count for google and, at least for me, the targeted traffic (that really counts) is still the one coming through keywords search (google organic)
I agree to you Dan,I would rather have a blog with active conversation than having a PR but with boring audience. I don’t really care about PR but some does because they say it tells how much traffic you get and your authority online. I only care about what my audience tells me, not the PR. IT’s just a figure right? It’s more interesting to talk with people and learn something new and improve. Like the comment of Rebecca to you.
In my opinion, do follow and no follow are equal good for your site. As well as the moderation of commenting to other sites. We can not rush the page rank of our site. We know how smart the google is…
As an SEO analyst i would tell that the dofollow links with leak out your PR juice but if you work for your regularly there will be no drop in your site.
Interesting post ..and i can see the engagement of people too ..Both PR and comment is important for a blog but it depends upon one’s need
I’m pretty sure Google and SEOmoz have articles on outbound links, from my understanding you don’t lose anything from linking out to anyone so long as the website doesn’t have malware or is a link farm.
Hats off Don! You’ve really got me thinking. Blogs are supposed to be discussion comunities and need people sharing their opinions in order to grow. Do follow links may not harm you but you should definitely avoid spammy replies.
Is thier a limit on link luv comments you can post?
Dan, I appreciate the opportunity for a DoFollow link. Unfortunately, G+ banned me due to their “real names” policy. I am a real person, but don’t choose to use my real life identity.
AG, You are in luck, I just read yesterday the G will be allowing nicknames going forward!!
Hi Dan,
I really don’t bother too much about that little affect on PR.. most of the time it won’t affect rankings and that is what important.
This is interesting and has made me rethink what I am doing on my own site. I have an affiliate site with the comments turned off so as not to distract from the main purpose of the page…having the visitor click on the affiliate link. After reading through the comments, going forward I am considering having certain posts on my site that aren’t affiliate pages with commentluv installed that would allow comments. What are your thoughts on this Dan?
Seth,
I think installing CL premium will help drive engagement and traffic to your site which will ultimately help you with you affiliate sales. I say go for it!
Its totally depends on SEO needs, if someone follow your blogs its not going to reduce seo result, most probably benefited by this act.
thanks!!!
I think that in need to have a good blog both page rank and comments are needed .
I think in the end it’s all about your end goal. If your website traffic and success (however its measured) depends on organic traffic then pay more heed to who you link to. If your website’s success depends on a community encouraging participation will always be a great bet.
I would sit down and figure out what is success for you and what is your end goal. Do whatever leads you there!
Great summation Mark.
They claim it does but you can prove the results by conducting an experiment.
I bet a dime for a doughnut that the websites talked about most on google plus get higher search results. Just like websites talked about on YouTube.
I was here for a dofollow link and now i feel sad.
Usama, not to be rude but if you read the words that are in bold and quite large right above the comment box it is very easy to have your link do followed. All you have to do is press the +1 button. I think it is a fair trade off, no?
I’m no expert in SEO either but I agree with you. PR isn’t a big deal depending on your web property. For blogs, it’s not so much about SERP’s as opposed to a loyal following.
Google +1′d and Tweeted for great content. thank you very much
Thanks for your comment Michael and for the social sharing luv..appreciate it.
Nice points, do follow blogs have advantages and advantages, I guess it just depend on who you follow and which blogs you choose to comment on.
Interesting debate, idk about rest but search engine hits increased after i started blog commenting
As i see do follow comments matters about the link itself, A matter of priority.
Allowing dofollow in the comments will attract more visitors to your site, that’s for sure. And thus, more traffic will come. The only thing you have to do is to monitor comments for spam because getting your every article spammed with senseless comments won’t add to your PR.
This is an interesting debate. I think you should be careful enough to see who is commenting. I have come across certain comments which were pre fabricated in a auto commenting software but they look real. I would perhaps not like it and most of other bloggers to.
Yes real comments of value can be given some “juice” from your pagerank as a good will gesture. Lets see what comes out of the debate. Good Luck for all
Ejaz, Good point. I am pretty strict on which comments I let through. If I sense that it is a robot or if someone does not enter their real name in the from field I will not accept it. I also only make my comment links do follow after 3 approved. This helps stop the drive by commenters.
I think dofollow or nofollow, if you are allowing comments on your blog, other pages on your blog are getting less link juice.Thanks for sharing this kind of post..
I think that page rank is a bit overrated. Blog will no comments is less attractive than a social blog with low page rank. If the links are good quality, I do not see a problem at all.
I agree Milena. I would rather have 20+ comments per post than a higher PR any day.
Blogs need good meaningful content and subscribers are nice. however, marketing sites require visitor traffic and need the page rank to remain competative.
I think it doesn’t really matter,the crawlers are very smart but i think its the least of their worries.
@Dan: Excellent point for debate. I think dofollow or nofollow, if you are allowing comments on your blog, other pages on your blog are getting less link juice.
You tend to get more comments if you make your blog a dofollow blog. If you stick to moderation and only approve ‘good’ comments, I think dofollow comments are much better.
In terms of link juice going out of your blog, Google already specified that dofollow or nofollow .. every link will leak juice
When someone puts a link on your website, a very small percentage of your page rank is passed from you, to the newly posted link. So is it bad for pagerank? It can be. Is it bad in general? It can be. You definitely want to make sure only to link back to people who are not breaking Googles guidelines. Then it becomes a big problem.
Thanks Don. Good point about being careful who you link out to.