At what point to stop comments on a blog? Do too many comments hurt the page?
-
I have a page that's ranking pretty well, and driving sales. That page is starting to get 10+ comments per day and is starting to get quite long. I was wondering if there is a point where I should disable the comments? My gut tells me that people interacting with the page, and Google seeing responses with the users SHOULD be a good thing not bad. But, then I think that a majority of the content of the page is no longer the article, but the comments.
All the comments are good, non spammy and directly related to the topic. People just asking questions, etc. Good engagement, I should be happy right?
-
The only reason why I'd ever disable comments if I'm way to tired of getting them and having to approve them or I decided to stop replying to comments. I'll tell you why.
Your page is ranking well for many reasons. One of the reason is likely due to that its a great piece of content. If it still continues to rank well and drive sales, then the 10+ comments per day obviously aren't harming its ability to do that, so why change the process of accepting comments? In addition, if it is a great piece of content, people are more likely to share it and you'll get more visits. I've seen many blogs where they closed comments because it was already a year or two old and it just seems they don't want to bother with the comments anymore and I really want to provide additional insight and yadda yadda; my comments are not going to hurt your post especially if it adds more unique and fresh content to that page only to help it stay fresh in Google's eyes, right?
Unless you switch the position of your content and the comments around, the comments will have little effect on your page's rank and conversion rate.
If you're happy with the way things are, let the comments keep coming. Use your spam filter, make sure you have "external nofollows" on comment URLs and if you really want to keep the value of your content strong, only approve the really good comments, not just the five word comments like, "wow, what a great post".
Good engagement, you are correct. Fresh & unique content, Google likes. More social signals; a good thing.
-
Yup! That sounds like a good interaction and a lively page that will keep presenting fresh, meaningful content each time it's updated. The only comments I'd worry about are spam (which you've screened) and really off-topic comments, but neither of those seem to be a problem. Since people are commenting under the same topic(s) as the article, it just adds to the page as a whole.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
How do I get more traffic for my blog?
Hi there, I would like to know how to work on my blog to get more organic traffic. Thanks!!
Content Development | | lucywrites1 -
My Guest Blog: Still A Good Link Building Resource?
In an effort to build some links, we want to really work on improving our blog content and exposure. We want to write two quality posts per week, and submit 1 quality guest post every 1-2 weeks. However, we're not sure how to go about submitting guest posts or who to submit them to? I found an all article from SEOmoz http://moz.com/blog/4-valuable-link-building-services but it's from 2010. Is myguestblog still a good source? Are there better ways of doing it? Also, is ever advisable to pay to submit a post? Some of the legal blogs (we're a law firm) have this option, but that strikes me as spammy or low quality links. Just to reiterate, we are striving to write high-quality useful content audiences will find beneficial, not just junk or salesmanship. If it takes longer than a week to write posts like that, that's fine. We just really need some specific advise on who we should be submitting our guest posts to and who we should avoid. Thank you all so much for any advice or suggestions, Ruben
Content Development | | KempRugeLawGroup0 -
Content Architecture - Breakout Pages
If you have a page that summarizes four different product types adequately in a chart that requires no scroll, is there an SEO justification to also breaking out each product into a separate page, but basically it would contain the same information? The SEO in me says yes, because that's more crawlable content you can optimize, but wouldn't it go against usability and general common sense?
Content Development | | SSFCU0 -
How do I redirect a page that no longer exists?
I changed the name of a blog article I wrote and the original name is giving a 404 error. I am not sure why it isn't being directed like the other articles I renamed to improve SEO. Since the webpage no longer exists, I don't know how to redirect it. I use Wordpress and Thesis. Thanks!
Content Development | | dealblogger0 -
Page Content?
So I have review pages for websites on my site, each website has a review around 400-500 words. Recently I had my writers write 2 additional articles on each site but about something they have there. My thinking was interlinking them allowing them to rank individually etc. However now after looking around etc.. I see that content that is upwards of 1000 words or more might be more powerful and the way this is all written etc.. I could easily put it all on one page.... So my question is do I go with 3 pages or 1 page. I can see strength in both
Content Development | | dueces0 -
Guest blog better than owned blog?
Say I write a great article about The Best Colleges at X and in the article there is a keyword linking to www.mydomain.com/productX my hunch is that it would actually be better for www.mydomain.com/productX if the article wasn't promoted to the colleges through www.mydomain.com/blog - instead it was promoted through www.yourdomain.com/blog my thinking is that the authority of another site linking to /productX with a popular post is higher than my own domain linking to /productX with a popular post. Am I right? Does it not matter? Am I completely wrong?
Content Development | | CleanEdisonInc0 -
Optimising my ecommerce blog
Hey guys, I am after suggestions on how i can better optimise my blog? www.imrubbish.co.uk/blog I have been getting regular blog posts up until say a month ago. Looking to get a new writer and get 3-4 blog posts a week done. Sometimes targeting products, sometimes general chat about bins. I am hoping you kind people can make a couple of suggestions i could be doing. Thank you
Content Development | | imrubbish0 -
Transfer existing blog to wordpress.org or start a new blog
My blog sits on the wordpress domain http://gardenbeet.wordpress.com/ - it has good page rank and has around 300-400 visits per day - should i move it to my website or Should I start a new blog? i have a page set up for it on my website but it now has good rank http://www.gardenbeet.com/content/design-blog.html - and now want to keep this URL am a bit confused - what is the best strategy in terms of SEO?
Content Development | | GardenBeet1