Blog post comments are a double-edged sword. For many bloggers they simply don’t get any comments – or enough of them. For others, their blog is so popular their comments are cluttered with hundreds of spam comments generated by “bots” which just trawl the web for blogs and then insert comments into them.

The notion behind such spam comments is that there is value in having links – the spam comments will usually include links back to some nefarious website where the owner believes (wrongly) that any link is valuable.  Luckily, of course, there are systems to prevent bots from adding comments to your blog. This website uses Akismet which in January alone has already blocked 49,010 spam comments from appearing on these pages..!

However, some website owners do not like using spam blocking software because it removes so many comments from their site it looks like no-one is commenting. Some people simply like to make their blogs look really busy by having loads of comments – even if many of those comments are garbage.

Another issue with blog post comments for many website owners and bloggers is they worry about negative and argumentative comments being published. The last thing they want is a bunch of people “flaming” them. So, they either switch off comments – meaning their blog looks unloved and lacking interaction – or they have to moderate every comment, wasting time and leading to delays in comments being published. Either way, such an approach is not good.

New research, however, shows that such worries about negative comments are unwarranted. The vast majority of comments on blogs appear to be positive and supportive. We should not worry unduly about comments – indeed bloggers should welcome them.

In fact, as the study confirms, most of the comments on blogs are actually so supportive they end up boosting the self-esteem of the blogger. Whilst comments make your website look “alive” and interactive, they also have another added benefit. Because most comments end up making you feel good about yourself it actually means you become more likely to blog more, leading to more comments, leading to even greater self-esteem. Oh, and by the way, it also leads to more search engine benefits, more social sharing and more traffic…!

So, even if you don’t use blogging as a business tool (and you should…!) then blogging will certainly help you feel good about yourself.