|
Secrets to Success
Deborah Cole Micek
and John-Paul Micek
|
What you can do to stem ‘sploggers’
Comment spam is a pain for anyone serious about business blogging. According to some researchers, nearly 30 percent of blog posts are spam. Add in spam comments and the number climbs to 50 percent.
Blogs designed to spew spam have a name -- splog. Wikipedia says a splog is "often nonsense or text stolen from other Web sites with an unusually high number of links to sites associated with the splog creator which are often disreputable or otherwise useless Web sites."
As a business blogger, it can get pretty frustrating logging in to your admin area and then finding several dozen spam comments.
And, it can get even worse. Apparently higher-ranked blogs get hit with more comment spam. I've had as many as 150 to 200 spam comments on our top-ranked business blogs in a 24- to 48-hour period.
Luckily, the open source community of programmers supporting WordPress have been creating plugins to help stop comment spam.
So, I've been able to make one simple change that has cut our comment spam down by 98 percent!
Here's what I did, and what you can do, too, if you're dealing with lots of comment spam on your business blog (on WordPress).
» Step 1: For WordPress users, log in to the admin area of your business blog. Click on the "options" tab, and then on the "discussion" tab. Scroll down to the subheading titled "Before a comment appears:" Make sure you check the box next to "An administrator must approve the comment (regardless of any matches below)."
» Step 2: Review all your comment spam for several days. Keep a list/journal of common/repeated words. This will not take much time, and is actually pretty easy.
» Step 3: Compile a list of single words used in comment spam. Review the list to be sure that none of those words is likely to be used in a legitimate comment to your business blog. (If you're running a business blog about poker, I'm sorry but you're going to be up the creek on this one.)
» Step 4: Again, for WordPress users, log in to the admin area of your business blog. Click on the "options" tab, and then on the "discussion" tab. Scroll to the bottom of that page and you'll see a subheading titled "comment blacklist." Take that list of words you compiled from your comment spam posts and paste it into the text entry area.
Be sure to also check the box next to "Blacklist comments from open and insecure proxies."
» Step 5: Click on "update options" and prepare yourself for a much more enjoyable business blogging experience.
This process will only take about 20 minutes, and it'll save you whole lot of headaches.
John-Paul Micek is the lead business coach at RPM Success Group Inc. Reach him at
JPM@RPMsuccess.com or toll-free at (888) 334-8151.
Deborah Cole Micek, chief executive officer of RPM Success Group, is a business success coach and life strategist. Reach her at
DCM@RPMsuccess.com or toll-free at (888) 334-8151.