Pingbacks in comments - bad?

[Ms Naughty]

I find myself approving pingbacks in my comments and wondering why I bother. Does anyone else approve them? Is it bad for SEO? Or is it just nice manners to acknowledge that someone has linked to you?

I'm wondering about this because I've submitted posts to Sugasm.com and it means that the post in question gets heaps of pingbacks, filling up the comments section.

I use Wordpress by the way, my blog is http://www.msnaughty.com/blog/

[Ms Naughty]

Hmm. Nobody wants to talk to me I guess you're all off at the beach.

Anyway, I did a bit of googling, I found these two articles that may be useful to anyone curious about pingbacks.
http://www.stonetemple.com/articles/...-and-seo.shtml
http://www.radicalbright.com/wp1/?p=5

I still don't know whether allowing pingbacks from other blogs does me damage because I have more outbound links.

[virgohippy]

I don't know either... but I'm a total newb to the whole "worship of the blog universe" thing.

Thanks for sharing the articles.

If I can form some sort of conclusion myself, and clearly say why, I'll be sure to come back here.

[walrus]

I'd be interested to see if anyone has an answer for this too! Although I can count my pingbacks on 1 hand for all of my blogs....it would still be nice to know.

[Ms Naughty]

It seems that with blogging, the rules should be different. Having outbound links is a standard part of blogging and the theory behind pingbacks is that it allows readers to find another post related to yours. In theory it should encourage lots of linking all over the place because you then get traffic back.

Then again, google is quite, quite mad. Who knows what the hell is going on with it.

(By the way, I wrote a silly post, asking why google has forsaken me like a guilty lover: Hey Google: Ms Naughty is about porn for women)

[bartjes]

That is a funny post, if that won't give you better google traffic, I don't know what will!

[walrus]

Originally Posted by grandmascrotum

It seems that with blogging, the rules should be different. Having outbound links is a standard part of blogging and the theory behind pingbacks is that it allows readers to find another post related to yours. In theory it should encourage lots of linking all over the place because you then get traffic back.

Then again, google is quite, quite mad. Who knows what the hell is going on with it.

(By the way, I wrote a silly post, asking why google has forsaken me like a guilty lover: Hey Google: Ms Naughty is about porn for women)

This got me to thinking...so now that I have a headache, I'd like to take a stab at what I believe to be the answer to your question.

If I understand pingbacks correctly, they are basicly a mechanism for doing a recipricol link exchange. Lets say, I take your Google post and tomorrow I write a similar one on Google love and add your URL to my post. That's one outbound link to you. Now when you get the pingback and approve it, I get a recipricol link back to my post from your comments page.

Plus it's a natural link, the type that Google should love, because in both cases it's surrounded by relevant text.

In your specific case, if I click on the sugasm post (73% of Americans Hate Porn) and follow the page down toward the bottom, I do indeed find a link back to your post. But I did notice that your not really doing much more than a normal link and perhaps that causes some problems. (Google seeing it as nothing more than another links page) Try adding a 3-4 sentence review after each link or embedding the link inside the review.

[Simon]

Damn, I was hoping someone who'd know would drop in on this thread. But now that Walrus has said "dunno" I guess we have to wait for the Boogie one.

I like that Googe come back post.

I think that the folks who specialize in "Porn for Women" need to come up with a special new term for it. That three-letter "for" will always be a problem (okay, maybe not always, but until they get much smarter with their indexing).

Is there already a "P4W" acronym? Maybe they'd index on that. Or maybe something like PTWL for Porn That Women Like. I don't know what might work best, but that middle word is getting no love at all.

[emmanuelle]

Originally Posted by Simon

Is there already a "P4W" acronym? Maybe they'd index on that.

P4W Was the term used for Canada's only prison for women in Kingston ON. In 2000 it was finally shut down due to the conditions (In 1938 it was declared "unfit for bears").

Most google searches for the term will call up the prison's history, a 1981 movie made about it, or source forge's 'Powertools 4 Wisehackers'.

[Simon]

Interesting history on that prison.
And that you'd know it.

Too late anyway. Seems that someone in Australia already owns the p4w.com domain. The ptwl.com domain is taken too. It's for sale though, at $4K.

Might need to give some more thought to this one. |goodidea

[Ms Naughty]

"Porn for women" is such a nebulous concept (and one hotly disputed by some as stereotypical) but it's useful because that's one of the main phrases that women will type in when they're after something different.

Anyway, it's interesting that we're all a bit vague on the pingbacks issue (actually, I'm vague on a whole heap of stuff with blogging LOL). I guess the thing is, it's nice to ping other blogs when you link to them, you may end up with a nice free link. So - ethically at least - it's only polite to list other people's pingbacks in return.

[Ms Naughty]

Perhaps that's where my nervousness comes from. The Sugasm is a clever idea and it's a great way to get your blog noticed in the wider circle of sex blogs. It also brings in some nice traffic. At the same time, the set of links can look rather spammy. Thanks for the suggestion about a few reviews here and there.

Actually, the Sugasm people changed their policy this week, you only have to repost the top 4 links.

[Simon]

Sometimes things get murkier and murkier before they clear. Personally I'm still way down in the murk on pingbacks, trackbacks, and tagging.

Let me try a specific question that came to me today when I was reading Walrus' XXXBlogManiac. On that blog I saw this post "Porn Flakes - Breakfast with a Boner," which reminded me of the "Perverted Breakfast Cereals" post on my XLog.

My question is, what would be the best way for both of us to make some use of this?

I was trying to decide between posting a comment on Walrus' blog, or editing my older Cereals post to add a link to his new post, or making a new post mentioning both Cereal posts. Then I read this thread again and realized it might be worth asking here. Particularly about how to use pingbacks, trackbacks, or tagging as those might relate to this kind of thing.

Any suggestions welcome.

[walrus]

In your instance, I would create a new post and trackback to my post. The reason is that with the trackback not only does it add your link to the comments section but it also adds an excerpt from your post. I would probably just add a link to the original post (creating a pingback) as it seems dorky to me to comment on my own post. A pingback only adds the author and title of the post.

Both of these types are recipricol in that a link is exchanged. A comment isn't recipricol but helps generate additional interest in a post since people do seem to like to read them.

When I visit others blogs, I'm usually looking for something to do a trackback to in a near future post. If I find something interesting but doesn't really work into something I have in mind, I'll leave a comment.

[walrus]

Something I probably should mention that may have gotten forgotten is that wordpress, by default, adds the "nofollow" tag to trackbacks / pingbacks. You need the DOFOLLOW plugin to resolve this.

[Simon]

Okay, Walrus, let's see how this works.

I installed the DOFOLLOW plugin and activated it, and I made a new post and used your trackback url in the trackbacks field.

[walrus]

and nothing....no trackback, no ping back...nada. I'll edit my post and try it in reverse to your original post

[Halfdeck]

I was wondering if grandma's pingback was working

I wouldn't get stuck on thinking too much about links. Pingbacks/trackbacks are a way to further the dialogue between bloggers, instead of just talking to ourselves or driving a sale. Google may reward us handsomely for that dialogue, but what's more important is the value added to our blog from that conversation. The end game *should* (i hope i dont sound too preachy lol) be building a great blog, and having people link to you because they love your blog -- not pulling cheap tricks to somehow pump traffic to some mundane site that helps surfers become one with the back button.

Blogs have an amazing reach that free sites will never have. When you post something you know other people can hear you from miles away, for better or for worse. Trackbacks, comments, etc are all part of that.

BTW, http://www.quirk.biz/searchstatus/ isn't a bad tool to check nofollows on sites, though a blog with nofollow won't stop me from leaving dumb comments.

[ponygirl]

Originally Posted by Halfdeck

BTW, http://www.quirk.biz/searchstatus/ isn't a bad tool to check nofollows on sites, though a blog with nofollow won't stop me from leaving dumb comments.

well now that's a nice little tool, thanks

[walrus]

Originally Posted by Halfdeck

I was wondering if grandma's pingback was working

Honestly, I kind of wondered the same thing and actually checked a few of the sites to see. BTW, they are working.

Originally Posted by Halfdeck

BTW, http://www.quirk.biz/searchstatus/ isn't a bad tool to check nofollows on sites, though a blog with nofollow won't stop me from leaving dumb comments.

I'll leave dumb comments as well without concern for the nofollow tag, I mentioned it because I didn't think a lot of folks realized that it was there.

[Halfdeck]

Originally Posted by walrus

I mentioned it because I didn't think a lot of folks realized that it was there.

Yeah, I didn't realize it either. I took down all my nofollows on blogs that I post semi-regularly.

[phatbiatch]

Originally Posted by Halfdeck

I was wondering if grandma's pingback was working

I wouldn't get stuck on thinking too much about links. Pingbacks/trackbacks are a way to further the dialogue between bloggers, instead of just talking to ourselves or driving a sale. Google may reward us handsomely for that dialogue, but what's more important is the value added to our blog from that conversation. The end game *should* (i hope i dont sound too preachy lol) be building a great blog, and having people link to you because they love your blog -- not pulling cheap tricks to somehow pump traffic to some mundane site that helps surfers become one with the back button.

Blogs have an amazing reach that free sites will never have. When you post something you know other people can hear you from miles away, for better or for worse. Trackbacks, comments, etc are all part of that.

BTW, http://www.quirk.biz/searchstatus/ isn't a bad tool to check nofollows on sites, though a blog with nofollow won't stop me from leaving dumb comments.

yea I thought I had read somewhere that what makes your blog more relevant and popular to SEO is when other people are linking to your blog in their actual posts? I think there are quite a few people who don't really get the knack of weblogging in adult. They just jump in because that's what everyone else is doing.

[virgohippy]

Originally Posted by phatbiatch

yea I thought I had read somewhere that what makes your blog more relevant and popular to SEO is when other people are linking to your blog in their actual posts? I think there are quite a few people who don't really get the knack of weblogging in adult. They just jump in because that's what everyone else is doing.

Give a hippy a break, I'm learning!!!

[phatbiatch]

Originally Posted by virgohippy

Give a hippy a break, I'm learning!!!

lol what ya talking about? . I wasn't referring to anyone here.

[Ms Naughty]

Are my pingbacks working? I think so. Although I'm not sure why they insist on being "comments" rather than "pingbacks". Maybe I need to have another dig around the admin area, there must be a box to tick somewhere.

While I have the writing part of blogging under control, all these other technical aspects create a bit of a learning curve. Wordpress has forced me to learn about PHP and Mysql databases among other things. It's been an uphill battle and there's still a lot to learn.