Desperate Comment Spammers
As I work my way through week two, I'm honored to discover that the desperate comment spammers have discovered two out of my three blogs. Their alleged email addresses always differ, but their spam is identical:
"I noticed that it’s hard to find your website in google, i found it on (insert arbitrary number here) spot, you should get some quality backlinks to rank it in google and increase traffic. I had the same problem with my site, your should search in google for – insane google ranking boost – it helped me a lot"
Apparently they didn't get the newsflash that Google penalizes gratuitous backlinks of the kind they're surely selling. I'm sure the average Wealthy Affiliate member is too smart to fall for this lame sales pitch and marks these comments as spam. However, the poor souls who fall for it probably get their site link spammed onto other blogs with vaguely complimentary comments that reek of "I can't speak English and am copying and pasting this illiterate drivel for a penny an hour."
Here's a typical example from my About.com site, which is targeted regularly:
Exciting post and thanks for sharing. Some factors in right here I have not believed about before. Many thanks for making this kind of a great publish which is truly quite nicely created. will be referring a good deal of friends about this.
I deep-six all such comments immediately, which means the poor sucker who paid for the backlink spam isn't even getting a link. Maybe that's a good thing, since it means they won't get zapped by Google by this worthless, outdated technique.
I suspect many others blogging here have already gotten this comment sales pitch or will get it in the near future. As you're clicking the "spam" button, remind yourself of one good thing about having your time wasted to clean it up: if spammers are finding your site, that means legitimate readers will, too.
Recent Comments
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Good post, Barb. I feel sorry for human spammers, but absolutely detest the "bots" that generate spam automatically. I can happily say that after I started using the GASP plugin, 99% of bot spam disappeared. I can cope with the few humans getting through, but Akismet does a good job with those. ~ Jude
Lol, this sounds very familiar! Plus, lately I've been getting one that repeatedly sends very lengthy spam comments, I have to scroll the page down to keep viewing it, sometimes many times in one day. Oh, and some in a different language...Chinese, I think.
Anyways, if I see that their "name" is just either a website name or keyword phrase, I just delete them. Why people think these methods are going to help them is beyond me, but they're obviously getting the wrong advice.
And, sadly, they're probably paying a lot of money for it, too. Too bad they don't know about Wealthy Affiliate.
Very true, I'm sure they're paying a lot for a "service" they don't need at all. They certainly could benefit from learning about Wealthy Affiliate. I've wondered about sending them an email telling about WA, but then again I'm not sure if this would actually get to them or is it just an automated email (bot?) address. Plus, would I be considered as a spammer then too, or not?
I've also been very tempted to give them a piece of my mind and tell them what I think of them spamming me, lol. But, then I think better of it since that would be a waste of my time.
Thank you for sharing, I new to this so i wouldn't know that was spam. Thank you I'll keep a eye out when I start to do my bogging.
I really laughed when this spam had found my site today.
It was obvious they aren't paying attention, my site is on page ONE, so what the heck can they offer me?
I have all the help I need here at WA! ;-) LOL Camilla
Hi - yeah, I get this to even my own website email addresses - "I noticed you weren't ranked on page one of Google, I can help you..." - and I get 10 or more duplicate emails to my various email addresses (my wife's, my various domains etc).
I sometimes even get multiple emails apparently from my own email address, or from PayPal etc - I'm getting very good at spotting spam emails these days.
1) anything that includes a ZIP file - trash it
2) anything from your email that you know you haven't sent - trash it (although it does mean that 1000's of others have received the same thing from apparently YOUR email address
3) if it's from PayPal - they will never include a ZIP file - and they will ALWAYS address to your name - not "Dear member etc"
4) anything that says you need to login to verify your account - rubbish - that doesn't happen - you may be sent an email to click on to validate your account - but not to reset it!!!
Unless comments are contributing to the discussion you have prompted with your post, or challenging them in an engaging way - delete them. Bad content is bad for your ratings.
Cheers, Mark
Not yet. I'm not getting a high volume of spam yet, but I'll be doing if that happens. For now, it just takes a minute or so to get rid of the BS.
I just looked again and it does say its activated , but at the top of the page is a button that says "Activate your account" "Almost done - activate your account and say goodby to comment spam". Then when you click the button they want $5.00 a month. Please tell me what you find out. Better check the plug in page.
I just installed Akismet, this minute, for my friend. I'm not sure where you are at, but in the US at least, there is no charge. I looked it up on google and I remember something about a sliding scale where you choose your price. This is what I found:
Personal
$0 - $120 / year
For personal, non-commercial sites and blogs
Choose Your Price!
Unlimited Sites
80,000 Monthly Checks
No Priority Support
Normal Content Checking
Not sure how you got it to try and charge you $5.00. I would probably deactivate it and try again.
I have it on all my websites and have never paid any money for it. Not sure what the difference is.
The API key is free. There are direction on how to get one. I got mine so long ago I do not remember the steps. I do remember it was not difficult.
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I have been getting those comments also. I just delete.