comments: connecting and reputation building

(x-posted from RTCRM Blog)

Photo Credit: Andy Piper Used via Creative Commons Attribution Copyright

Depending on your point of view blogging is either the greatest thing to happen to marketing in the history of modern marketing, or the most over-hyped channel in history. Like most everything, it’s really somewhere in between. Blogging is honestly a great tool, if you use it well. Fame and fortune are hard to come by via blogging, but building a reputation — that’s a bit easier.

There are two main avenues to go about building your reputation via blogging:

1. Writing a blog
2. Commenting on other blogs

Since most people are familiar with the power of writing a blog — let’s talk about option number two. When I’m working with clients, they are often surprised that I don’t start out recommending that they write a blog. To me this is like trying to run a marathon when you’ve never even laced up your running shoes. It doesn’t matter if you are trying to build up your individual professional reputation or build awareness of your company in B2B or B2C markets. This works for all of them, but there are slightly different approaches. It often doesn’t occur to someone that leaving a comment on a blog can work not only at an individual level, but also have positive (or negative) effects at a B2B and B2C level.

Best Practices for Blog Commenting

Regardless of the reason you are commenting on a blog, if you are doing it for professional reasons there are a few best practices to keep in mind.

Technorati Tags: blogs, blogging, comments, commenting, wom

1. Add value to the conversation. Forget about marketing and be a human being and respond to what you just read. If you are in a regulated industry like Pharma, you need to use some common sense here. Be aware and be very clear if you are speaking for yourself or your company.
2. Utilize the URL or “Website” field. This is where you mention your website. Almost all blogs have a place for commenters to leave their website. If you say something interesting, people will click to learn more about you. If you don’t have your own blog then link to your LinkedIn.com profile, or other appropriate location
3. Use a consistent and appropriate name. Blog comments can appear in search results. Make sure you use your full professional name.

It’s really that simple. Picking the right blogs to comment on to achieve business and marketing goals is a bit more challenging. There’s more science to that to ensure that the blogs have the right type of content, reach and engagement levels, and will allow you to truly build relationships over time. But, a little common sense can also go a long way.

Measuring Success

The last element of this technique I want to quickly cover in this post is measurement. The basics are really quite simple.

1. Website Analytics: If you are linking to your website or blog from your comments, simply check your analytics program to see if people are clicking through.
2. Responses: Are people responding to your comments and continuing the conversation based on what you said? That’s a great outcome.
3. References: Are the bloggers you are engaging with seeking you out in different arenas or referencing things you’ve said in comments in later blog posts? It’s a softer outcome than click-through rates, but it’s a highly desirable outcome.

Here’s one final tip. If you want an easy way to keep track of all those comments you’ve been leaving, you can use a service like coComment. It will track all the conversations you participate in and aggregate them for you.

So get out there and join in the conversation!