When is a comment SPAM?

When is a comment SPAM?

Recently, I was exposed to an interesting dilemma.  First, some background.

The Ultimate Blogging Toolkit has as one if its missions to help readers increase traffic to their own blogs.  This is done through simple sharing of discoveries that work (or sometimes not) for me.  The hope is that the average blogger will learn from and contribute to the ongoing discussion.

Since starting “The Kit” I have watched my visitor counts grow slowly, recognizing there is still a high bounce rate of people who found the site through search, but quickly realized it wasn’t what they needed.  (That’s not necessarily bad news, since the search engines are actually seeing me!)  Just in the last couple of weeks though, I have received the first comments to my posts.

Enter the dilemma.

The first post was from someone whose comment simply expounded on the merits of a certain water filtration system.  I know we’re all trying to promote our own thing, but there wasn’t even an attempt to weave in a relevant comment to the post and then respectfully mention how that post’s topic might help his site and then provide a link.  I’m all about sharing each other’s visibility, but I’m also not going to be SPAMed.  Comment deleted.

Then there was the comment that came from someone promoting a weight loss product.  This time, she (I know it’s she because she signed her name) submitted the following:

“Interesting blog, I just stumbled on it and I’m already a subscriber I recently went down 30 pounds in 30 days, and I want to discuss my weight loss success with as many people as possible. I wrote about my experience on my blog, and I welcome your suggestions!”

On the surface, this one at least made a kind remark about an “interesting blog” but still a nogo.  I can buy the “stumble on it” part, but this is neither a subscription blog nor do I have any trackback links.  My thinking is that this was a generic posting attempting to look like a thoughtful post.  Nice try, but again, comment deleted.

My favorite was a comment touting the benefits of a certain group of females collected on a particular web site.  Nuff said.  Comment deleted.

But I must cite the first valid comment that has been approved on The Ultimate Blogging Toolkit.  In the post, “Social Networking to Promote your Blog?  But which one to use?” I received a very kind post from http://www.audiforsalebyowner.info/.

“Great site this http://www.ultimatebloggingtoolkit.com and I am really pleased to see you have what I am actually looking for here and this this post is exactly what I am interested in. I shall be pleased to become a regular visitor “

First, I appreciate the kind words, but more importantly, this is a perfect example of many of the suggestions put forth here.  (The least I can do since this person took the time to comment without SPAM, is to provide some Search Engine juice by posting a link back.)  Take the time to create relationships – don’t just SPAM people.  Now I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t know anything about this site and I am not providing an endorsement.  I can’t because I don’t actually have anything more than a URL, but that is how relationships begin.  This person took the effort and has gained a small amount of benefit from doing so.

My sincere hope is that this person will not only return to see what’s new, but share in the discussions so that we can all benefit from this new-found relationship.  (A link back here as a valued resource wouldn’t hurt either.  ”

Dave