Commenting has been a big part of SEO for awhile now. That’s not to say it’s a good part (it’s not) but it’s very popular, far more popular than it should be. Anyone who has ever had the pleasure of running a blog has gotten comments along the lines of, “wow great content, I feel very enlightened by what you have to share and can look forwards to you writing more for the future times!” accompanied by a link to cheap Nikes or knock of medication. Of course, not all comment SEO attempts are so transparent, but even people who are putting in an honest effort seem to be doing it wrong. Let’s take a look at how to do it right, courtesy of Matt Cutts.
The first thing Matt Cutts has to say about blog comments for SEO is a little surprising. In general, they aren’t regarded as spam. I honestly wouldn’t have guessed that, but there it is. Does that mean you should run out and start commenting on every blog you come across? Of course not, because while the occasional comment won’t be regarded as spam, a pattern of it most definitely will be flagged as spam, getting you penalized.
So, if you want to leave the occasional comment that has a little bit of rich anchor text in it, you should be okay. Just make sure it’s actually relevant to the page you’re commenting on and that someone will get some value out of your link. I know that can be hard to figure out sometimes, so when in doubt, just don’t do it.
A safe way to comment, according to Mr. Cutts, is to comment using your real name. This goes hand and hand with Google authorship. When you’re putting your official presence out there with your profile attached, it’s very unlikely to be spammy, at least as far as Google is concerned.