Most of us have a few favorite websites that we frequent on a regular basis. Not only big and popular sites like Facebook or Twitter, but smaller sites as well. I know there are several I visit at least once per week.
Obviously some sites have been around longer and are more popular than others. When a site has topics and content that I can relate to and is of interest to me I will usually leave a comment.
Recently I wrote about the average lifespan of a website, which I have been thinking about for a while now. I keep thinking about how many websites call it quits and disappear in a short period of time. Many without warning or indication.
If your goal is to build backlinks we are often told we should comment on additional sites rather than the same site on a regular basis. By doing so, you gain more backlinks, and from other root domain names. The thinking is that commenting on 100 different sites is better than on the same 1 site 100 times. It’s kind of like getting a vote for your site, which amounts to 1 person voting for your site 100 times vs. 100 different people voting for your site one time. That’s what they say anyway. There are a number of other factors involved, but that’s the basic concept and idea.
So I was thinking, say you did comment on a site you really liked on a regular basis and happened to get 100 comments with your link over time. Then, one day the site just quits posting new content and it eventually just disappears. Not only would your 100 backlinks be gone with it, but you would have wasted a lot of time.
There was a site that I belong to that actually switched from comments and links visible to guests (everyone) including Google, to comments visible to members only. If you have to login to see a comment it means Google can’t see them either. Unless for some reason Google likes to go around joining various sites. What that amounted to was I lost a few hundred backlinks that I got over a 3-4 year period of time. That wasn’t the sole purpose for joining and participating at the site, but the way I looked at it was it was an added perk or bonus. I was a little bummed out and don’t participate that much there anymore.
Obviously getting a backlink shouldn’t be what it is all about, but it’s a definite plus if you do.
I don’t want to discourage anyone from visiting and commenting at their favorite sites on a regular basis. I just want to point out that sites come and go fairly often. When they do go they take your comments with them. Unfortunately there is no way to know or predict if a site will be around for a long time or not.
If you write guest posts for other sites it might be even more disappointing if a site dies off because even more hard work and time would have been involved. When these go “POOF” I go “OUCH” that’s a total bummer. I would definitely try to pick more popular sites that have been around for a while when guest posting.
I am the site owner and administrator of DialMe.com. I write Boonex Dolphin Tutorials on the main part of this website where you will also find tips, webmaster resources and more. Here, on the blog I write about a variety of topics surrounding WordPress, technology, social media/networking, SEO, and webmaster resources.
Boonex Dolphin, Wordpress, Seo, Technology, Web Server and Hosting Specialist.
I was a regular commenter on 1 site, I think I got around 80 comments there all dofollows. One day I saw my comments, in fact all the comments from other commenters as well – GONE! The reason being that the site owner switched host from Host A to Host B. When I email him, he told me that the comments were not able to be transfered during the switch. Gosh! That moment I just realized I can’t put all my eggs into 1 basket.
Peter Lee recently posted..How to Scan Your Computer Without an Antivirus
Well that is a bit of a bummer. Either they were in a hurry or they didn’t know what they were doing. I don’t know if I would bother commenting there again. If they switch hosts in the future it could happen again. 80 comments is a lot to lose and most likely it took a while to get them.
Yea it took me about 1 year to gradually leave those comments on the site. After the incident, Google Webmaster Tools showing links from that site to mine were decreasing day by day. You’re right I don’t bother to leave comments there anymore.
Peter Lee recently posted..How to Keep Track of Your Photos
Wow, I know that was a lot of work. However, good lesson learned. It gives you something to think about when building backlinks.
Leonardo James recently posted..Best Water Softener Reviews For 2012
Agreed. Commenting on different sites is far more reliable than commenting on same site. In this way you are guaranteed that your precious backlinks will not vanish suddenly. It’s quite harder to get links from different sites but yet it’s reliable too.
Jocelyn recently posted..אלומיניום 2
There are some really important and useful information in your article, it isn’t worth for commenting on the members’ comment area, because the search engines don’t find them. If somebody disables the comment section on the blog it has got always a reason.
Karina recently posted..Noch eine Woche bis Sommerurlaub
If a site on which I write a guest post suddenly goes *poof*, I send a polite letter to the owner asking if I can republish my post somewhere else. If he doesn’t respond, I go ahead and publish that post elsewhere.
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What I’ll be thinking if ever the site where I placed my links disappeared is that I should just look for another site where I can participate actively as I was back in the old site. It’s not like my website was the one that disappeared, right? I just have to continue doing whatever I was doing. Oh, and you’re right about looking for other sites because it can help you become close to a lot more people than just focusing on one site.
Hi
Thanks for sharing this great post !
Well,this is sheer luck.You may have done a good SEO analysis before posting your links on the particular site but you cannot anticipate when can the PR of that site dropped so drastically that it closed down.
Thanks again
Regards
It makes a lot of sense, DialMe. When It comes to link building campaigns, I don’t recommend putting more than 10 links per website.
Cristian Stan recently posted..Best Rowing Machines
Good article that describes the fragility of creating links and some good advice to try and avoid all that hard work of creating blog posts of some value and time just disappearing always worth spreading your posts over a number of sites.
Good article that describes the fragility of creating links and some good advice to try and avoid all that hard work of creating blog posts of some value and time just disappearing always worth spreading your posts over a number of sites.
I think it’s always better to comment on multiple sites rather than a single websites. Aside from the fact that its a better strategy, website shutdown is one thing that may cost a lot to your part.
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I comment on dofollow blogs but there are few blogs that approves the comment and with that percentage I dont think they will benefit the website..So what to do to get high number of comments approved.
The number one thing that will prevent a lot of your comments from getting approved is you entered your keyword/keyphrase only in the name field on the comment form. Many sites will simply delete your comment when they see that. You should use a real name most of the time, with the exception of sites with keywordluv that specifically say so in the bottom of the comment form. This site does have keywordluv at the moment, which means you would enter Real Name@keyword in the name field. I have changed your name to John (please use a real name next time) so in the name field you would enter John@Offshore Software Company. That is for sites that have keywordluv. If they don’t specifically say so, then use your name only. You will still get a backlink for your name (the name field), and your comment is much more likely to get approved.