Are You Doing This To Establish Yourself As The Go-To Person In Your Niche?
Do you remember a few years ago a lot of marketers swore by forum marketing?
One of the greatest things about forums was (and still is if you are lucky enough to find one that is active) the ability to find a targeted audience, share, engage and establish yourself as an expert (if this is indeed the case).
You see, people in forums ask questions and this allows you to give advice, be helpful and this often results with people wanting to find out more about you and your business.
Using the principles of forum marketing and relationship building you can do the same using blogs, and this is how?
Subscribe To Comments
Okay, subscribing to comments alone is not going to instantly make you the go-to person but stick with me as I explain.
People use the comment sections of blogs to ask questions. Not every blog owner responds to comments or they jump in and only answer a few on each post.
This allows you to step-in and fill the void.
If you know the answer to a question, are certain you are providing value, then this is the time to share your knowledge.
As people become familiar with you and the information you share, see how helpful you are, they will often visit your site to find out more about you.
Additionally, the blog owner may do the same, after all, you’ve just helped her (or his) readers out and created a lot of useful content for their site; and you never know where this may lead (guest blogging invites, joint ventures, etc).
For best results you will want to find blogs that are targeted to your niche and generate a lot of comments.
It is fair to assume the majority of readers have an interest in the niche and therefore are a targeted audience.
You can find blogs in your niche by using Google. Simply type in your keywords followed by the term blog, example, seo blog, and you should find relevant results.
Subscribe to the blogs that you find by grabbing the RSS feed or, alternatively, bookmark the sites so that you can easily find them again.
This will make it easier for you to discover when a new post has gone live.
Tick The Box
As you can see from the image below, once you have taken the time to leave a comment most blogs offer the option to ‘subscribe to comments‘ so you will be notified by email of any follow-up comments.
NOTE: Some sites use third party services to manage their comments but these will also allow you to receive follow-up emails when new comments are posted.
Now, instead of sitting on the site and refreshing the browser every 5 minutes to see what new comments have been left, you can check your inbox (some popular posts generate comments for days, even weeks, after they have gone live).
After you have scrolled through quite a few ‘thank you’ and ‘great post’ replies you will often see a comment where someone is asking for more information, for clarification, for advice, for additional resources and so on.
This is your time to shine, jump back in and provide value.
I recommend you do this where you can but do not overdo it.
Blog commenting etiquette still applies and you should never post spammy comments or comments that are filled with self-promotion, this will not help you in the long run.
Additional benefits of subscribing to comments is that you will be able to know when people reply to what you have written, allowing you to begin a conversation.
On a final note, be sure to use your real name so people can make positive connections with you, if you leave a great comment but with a name like ‘affordable website hosting’ you will probably not get much interaction going; people like to talk to people.
Blog Commenting Can Build Relationships
If blog commenting is already a part of your routine, using the subscribe to comments method I have shared with you will allow you to get more mileage out of what you are already doing.
The connections you make and the relationships you build from blog commenting can be accelerated by jumping in and providing value and helping others; and what better way than helping those that seek it.
Best wishes,
Kelly-Anne Foxley
P.s. If you have a WordPress blog and would like to offer your commenters the ability to subscribe to comments then you can use the ‘subscribe to comments‘ plugin.
If you liked this post you should also read:
When Thank You Just Isn’t Enough
13 Ways To Encourage Blog Comments
Blog Commenting For Traffic Generation
11 Comments
Trackbacks/Pingbacks
- Fadi Semaan - how to establish yourself as an expert or a go to person in your niche http://ow.ly/YZFn #SEO
- Keith - RT @fmsseo: Are You Doing This To Establish Yourself As The Go-To Person In Your Niche? http://bit.ly/6Vg0mW
@Shane
I’m glad it got you thinking, I’m sure you’ll probably find a great way to expand on the idea.
@Lee
I agree, I don’t like to see blogs where they have opted to have the check box ‘checked’ by default; it should always be the commenters choice.
Best wishes,
Kelly-Anne
Giving commentator an option to receive followup comments via email is good, but I’ve seen some blog owners have checked box that, that’s not a good practice.
I do have this plugin in this blog, so I think it would help readers who want a followup comments.
Blog commenting definitely could help to build community as well as blog branding. That’s what I love to do and I find it effective and very useful too.
This is a great post Kelly, keep going!
Best Regards,
Lee
That’s a pretty cool idea, I must say. It had never occurred to me to participate in blog comments beyond just adding one comment of my own.
Definitely something to think about.
Cheers,
Shane
Excellent advice and something I practice religiously. I sift through the comments on the way down to leave my own, checking to make sure I don’t duplicate and to see who else I can respond too.
I leave multiple replies on a singular post if the opportunity is there.
And oh yes, you will be notice and the perks are there.
Thanks Dennis and JR for the positive feedback.
Great post Kelly! I love Comment Luv and I Dofollow in comments as well. I also use subscribe to comments, and threaded comments for a better display.
Blogging is all about community and these tools can really help you to build a better blog.
I actually am blind to that tick box until now. I never connected this little tick box with the idea of becoming a go-to person. Again, it takes a post such as this to bring to our attention some cool thing that’s been staring us in the eye all along.
.-= James M.´s amazing last blog ..H-a-ck-ed! =-.
Thank you James. It is often the small subtle things that can have a big impact on a marketing strategy, brand promotion, etc.
I’ve always thought about my blogs as a way to try to make myself the go-to person. Doesn’t quite work out that way all the time, but it’s my hope.
.-= Mitch´s amazing last blog ..Are You A Lurker Or Participant In Life? =-.
@Mitch
Agreed, if you have a blog then this is a good place to share your knowledge and establish yourself as the go-to person. When we spend time off of our site and help people, in forums, on blogs, in groups, the effect is the same, people visit our site to see what else we are sharing.
@Eric
It definitely works. These things work in moderation and when you add it an already diverse mix of marketing and traffic generation tactics then you’ll have success with it. It’s when people focus on one marketing strategy, one sources of traffic, that when it stops working they essentially feel like they are starting from scratch.
Best wishes,
Kelly-Anne
This is something most people overlook. I personally don’t do much of this at all because I don’t find it’s a benefit of my time with what knowledge I have on different topics and blogs.
This is a great way to share though and to get yourself out there and be known even more on a particular niche as well as show you’re a real person. Solving problems and helping each other out and shining in your own light when given the opportunity.
Great post – often overlooked topic here!
.-= Eric´s amazing last blog ..Pop Posts =-.