How to Get Rid of Spam on Your Blog

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As I mentioned in To Blog or Not to Blog, blogging is a great way to promote your expertise to a wider audience.  However, one of the downsides to your content becoming popular is that you will start to attract unwanted comments – otherwise known as spam.   Basically these are people who are using your blog to promote their own products which are not usually ones that you would want to advertise on your website!  If you don’t filter these out then it make your blog look really unprofessional.

So how can you prevent these unwanted comments from taking over your blog?

Well there are two ways – you can either add a spam filter or CAPTCHA form on to your blog.

A spam filter will block the comments from appearing until you approve them.  One of the most well known spam filters is Akismet, which will hold your comments so that you can review them and approve or delete as necessary.  In fact, if you’ve got a WordPress website then the Akismet plugin is added as standard.

However, you can be clever with your spam comments.  If you get one that is praising your blog post then you can edit it and take out the link to the website.  This means that you can keep the comment on your blog but you won’t be adding backlinks to any dodgy websites!

A CAPTCHA form is when the person has to key in some characters or a mathematical equation before they can post their comment.  You can download a CAPTCHA plugin if you have a WordPress website or you can get a free CAPTCHA for your site.  You’ve probably seen the image below when you’ve completed online forms.

Because I’ve got a WordPress website, I personally use Akismet and it gets rid of around 100 spam comments a week which would otherwise be appearing on my blog.  But either option will help you to keep your blog looking professional and spam free.

5 Ways to Promote Your Blog

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So you’ve started to regularly write a blog, and got some of your contacts to read your articles and write comments.  In my previous blog, I gave some tips on where to get content for your blog.  Now I’m going to show you 5 easy ways to share your content to a wider audience.

On your website.  First of all, promote your blog on your website – have a list of the most recent posts on the home page and a link to the blog if it isn’t integrated into your site.  Also add an RSS button on every page of your site so that people can easily subscribe to your blog feed.  I use Feedburner to set up my RSS feed.

Promote offline.  If your blog provides tips and advice to your target market then put a link to your blog on your business cards and other promotional literature such as flyers and brochures.  Don’t just use the word blog though, say something like “Go here for great tips on how to promote your business online” and then add the link to the blog or even a QR code!

Add to signatures.  You can put a link to your blog on any online forum and email signatures that you have.  I use WiseStamp to create my email signatures as they enable you to add a link to your blog post which updates every time you post a new blog. 

Ask for comments.  You can build engagement with your readers by asking them to comment on your blog.  Ask questions or write something that will provoke a debate.  You don’t have to be rude or confrontational but you can be controversial about a particular subject and ask people for their opinions.  If people comment then they are more likely to share your content with their online followers and friends.

Use social media.  Add social media buttons at the end of each blog for people to share, eg via Twitter or Facebook.   If your blog is on WordPress then you can add plugins that will automatically post your blog out to Twitter and Facebook whenever you publish a post.  And if you’ve written a lot of blogs over a period of time then use plugins such as Tweet Old Post to promote previous content to your online contacts.

If you want to get more tips on how to set up and manage your blog, then check out our free guide “How to Start a Blog”.  This guide will show you how to use blogs to build engagement with your contacts and raise your online profile.  It also contains the top 20 WordPress plugins that you need for your blog.