If you run a WordPress blog, you probably use Akismet to handle and manage comments left by readers. Akismet is the default plug-in and works very well.

Or does it?

While Akismet does an excellent job in weeding out the spam comments from the legitimate ones, it does have its flaws.

Akismet is Flawed

The problem with Akismet is that it allows blog owners to specify which comments are legitimate and which are spam. This is completely opinion based and differs for each blog owner. Because of this, blog owners could inadvertently mark legitimate comments as spam. Sometimes this happens by accident, and other times they truly think the comment is spam, even if it isn’t. Obviously, one’s opinion can differ from another’s.

Once a comment gets marked as spam, any new comments that reader makes will automatically get marked as such across all blogs that use Akismet to manage comments. This is done through tracking the IP address and email address.

The system is obviously flawed. Akismet allows users to request that they be white-listed again, but it’s no guarantee that will happen.

There are other problems I could get into, such as privacy issues, but I’ll leave that one alone. Here are my two gripes I have with Akismet and why I have found a better alternative to manage comments on this blog.

1. Marking Legitimate Comments As Spam

Most likely you’ve scoured the spam folder, looking for legitimate comments to un-mark as spam. I used to spend a lot of my time doing this, as legitimate comments would get filtered out and be marked as spam, even though they weren’t.

Not only is this annoying, but it wastes so much time – time I don’t have.

2. Not Allowing Legitimate Comments At All

This was the last straw for me. It’s one thing to prevent spam comments from getting through, but when legitimate comments from readers are being blocked entirely, it’s time to make a change. A blog isn’t a blog unless readers are able to comment on posts, and I wasn’t about to ignore this problem. I needed to make a change, FAST!

I don’t know how long this was going on for, but Ana from Traffic Generation Cafe made me aware that her comments weren’t getting through. It was apparent that Akismet was blocking her comments altogether. She advised me that I find an alternative comment management plug-in to handle comments, otherwise I could be losing out on other legitimate comments, and ultimately readers. Thanks, Ana!

So that’s exactly what I did.

Akismet Alternatives

There are quite a few alternatives to manage blog comments. Some paid, some free. If you’re like me, I’m a huge fan of free stuff. Let’s take a look at 5 of them.

5 Free Anti-Spam WordPress Plug-Ins

1. Bad Behavior – Bad Behavior is a PHP-based solution for blocking link spam and the robots which deliver it.

2. Sblam! – Stand-alone PHP script or WordPress plug-in, whichever you choose.

3. AntiSpamBee – Protects your blog from spam by replacing the comment field.

4. Defensio – Defensio is an advanced spam filtering web service that learns and adapts to your behaviors and those of your users.

5. G.A.S.P – This plugin will add a client side generated checkbox to your comment form asking users to confirm that they are not a spammer. It is a lot less trouble to click a box than it is to enter a captcha and because the box is genereated via client side javascript that bots cannot see, it should stop 99% of all automated spam bots.

My Anti-Spam Plug-In Recommendation

I am currently running G.A.S.P. on this blog, and I absolutely love it. If I had to recommend a plug-in to manage blog comments, it would be G.A.S.P. I also use a plug-in called Simple TB Validation. Simple TB Validation performs a simple but very effective test on all incoming trackbacks in order to stop trackback spam.

With both of these plug-ins combined, I get very little comment spam. I still get a small percentage that I just delete, but I don’t have to go sifting through the spam folder anymore. It has saved me a ton of time, and I know it will help you manage comments more effectively.

The best part is, you won’t be turning away readers due to them not being able to comment on your blog. I urge you, consider deleting Akismet and finding an alternative. You and your readers will benefit greatly.

What Do You Use?

What are you using to manage blog comments and combat spam? Let us know in the comments below. And while you’re there, see G.A.S.P. in action by checking the little box to confirm you’re not a spammer.

The 4th of July is just hours away. What a great time to be with family and friends and to watch some spectacular fireworks displays!

On that exciting note, I’m excited to announce my first ever comment contest winners!

June was a rather busy month, and July is already proving to be just as busy, if not busier. There was a lot going on with the growth of this site and blog, and I was pleased with the turnout that was received.

I felt there could have been more commenters and more competition among the ones who did comment, but overall I’m happy as I gained more traffic and new readers, and hopefully kept them.

Without further ado…

Top 5 comment contest winners:

• Mici @ Click On P… (46)
• JR @ Internet Mar… (43)
• Cebu Tech Blogger… (10)
• Neil (5)
• andy @ jordan II … (4)

Congratulations to Mici for coming out on top. It was a tough battle with JR there towards the end, but you pulled it off!

Congrats to the rest of the winners… you all deserve it. To those who commented but didn’t make it on the list… I want personally thank you for taking the time to read my blog and comment. I truly appreciate it.

If you remember, I announced a bonus award to anyone who spread the word about my contest. To my surprise there were only three of you who shared this contest. But anyway, here are your permanent backlinks from me…

• Dennis Edell from Personal Coaching
• David Hurley from Grasp The Nettle
• Mici from Entertainment Reviews

Claim Your Prizes…

Okay, this is a request. The top 5 winners must contact me to claim their prizes. There are many reasons for this, but I feel this is a better approach than me trying to hunt you all down to get a hold of you. You can simply use the contact form or email me directly.

UPDATE:

Mici has opted for the cash. So, the remaining prizes look like this:

JR – One-month banner ad (125X125) provided by Peter Lee, plus 10 free .edu backlinks package. JR, you can go ahead and contact Peter directly to claim your prizes.

Bert and Neil – One month free access to David Hurley’s Internet Marketing Articles PLR site.

Andy – One month free link or banner ad on my home page.

I am still waiting to hear from Neil and Andy.

I guess that’s about it. I want to thank you all again for your support and readership. If you’re coming to my blog for the first time, I urge you to stay a while as you’ll learn a thing or two, and maybe subscribe to my feed so you don’t miss anything new as well as contests I’m planning for the near future.

P.S. Just because the comment contest is over, I still encourage you to leave your thoughts in the comment section. It helps add value to the posts and is also helpful to other readers. Plus, all comments are “do follow” so my juicy PR power will spread your way.

June is underway, and I’m excited to announce the first ever comment contest on this blog.

It’s been a long time coming, and I believe it’s time to start rewarding my faithful readers who take the time to comment and leave their feedback on my posts. Of course, I hope to bring in new readers as well and keep them coming back.

Contest Prizes

Prize winnings include (in no particular order):

1. $25 cash prize offered by Dennis Edell.

2. One-month banner ad (125X125) provided by Peter Lee, plus 10 free .edu backlinks package.

3 & 4. One-month free membership to David Hurley’s Internet Marketing Articles PLR site, offered by David Hurley and myself.

2 separate winners will each get one month free membership access. The membership fee will be refunded to you in full through PayPal by myself after your purchase. More details will be provided to the winners.

5. One-month link or banner ad on the home page of ReplaceYourSalary.com. Link will be “do follow.”

Contest Rundown

Winning is very easy and only requires that you comment regularly on this blog to have a chance to win.

Simply put, be on the “Top Readers” list at the end of June, and you’ll win one of the prizes mentioned above. The first-place winner will get to choose his/her prize. The rest of the winners will be awarded the remaining prizes in the order listed, as well as the order in which you won.

To know if you’re on the “Top Readers” list, you can find it on the right side-bar between NetworkedBlogs and Useful Links. It lists the top 5 commentators throughout the entire month, so as long as you’re on the list when I check it on June 30th, you’ll win.

Don’t quite understand how it works? Leave a comment below.

BONUS:

Now, here’s where it gets really fun. Everyone has a chance to win the bonus, so listen up.

Since this is my very first comment contest, I’d really like to get the word out about it, and I need your help.

Anyone that spreads the word about the contest and provides proof of doing so, you will receive a permanent link with your chosen anchor text on the winning results post that will follow the end of the contest.

It doesn’t matter how you go about spreading the word, just make sure that any and all links point back to this post.

Comment Rules

Unfortunately, my blog gets quite a bit of spam and useless comments. Many never see the light of day.

I don’t quite have a comment policy in place yet; although, I’ve been implementing it since the beginning, and I’m going to be cracking down even more now that the contest is underway.

In order for your comments to count, you’ll need to follow these 2 simple rules:

1. Use a REAL name. I have KeywordLuv installed so that you can use your “name @ keywords” in the name field when leaving a comment (first name is fine). I ask that you please respect this.

Or…

You can leave your name at the bottom of your comment. Either way is fine, but you must include your real name. If I don’t see your real name, your comment will be deleted without thinking twice. Sorry, but like I said, I get a lot of comment spam.

2. Provide value. Along the lines of comment spam, if your comment provides absolutely no value whatsoever, then poof, your comment will be deleted without warning. This will be heavily enforced, maybe even more so than rule #1.

I can’t stand stupid little “hey, nice post” type comments. Most of you will know what I mean by this. What I’m looking for are comments that add to the discussion in some way, provide your own thoughts on the issue, etc. Actually taking the time to leave a meaningful comment will go along way and only benefit you.

OK, that’s it! You have the details, now start commenting.

Note: if you want to make sure you never miss an update on my blog, you may want to subscribe to my RSS Feed. Just sayin’.

Thanks!

Okay, here’s a quick and easy way to earn $10. My good friend Dennis Edell is giving away $10 to ten people. One of those people can be you.

Simply head over to his blog at DennisEdell.com and leave intelligent, thought provoking comments on any of his blog posts. If you’re in his top ten commentator list at the end of March, you’ll win $10.

Easy enough, right?

Well… better head to this post to read the rules first.

I’ll warn you now that the competition will be a bit fierce. I’ll also mention that I’ll be participating as well.

Comment if you dare!

Seriously, making money online doesn’t get much easier than this right here.

The creator of CommentLuv, Andy Bailey, has created another awesome plugin for WordPress called TwitterLink Comments.

Basically what this plugin does is allow commentators to type in their Twitter user name. Once the comment is left, a “Follow Me” link will appear next to the commentator’s name. This allows readers to be able to follow them on Twitter easily if they find their comment useful.

If you look below the comment box you will notice a blue rectangular box with an input field. You can just enter your Twitter user name here once, and the link will show next to every comment you make from then on. Cool, huh?

To read all about the plugin check out the post: http://wpmu.org/twitterlink-comments-hassle-free-follow-me-links-for-your-commenters/.

I’ve installed this plugin because I know how popular Twitter is and hopefully this will be a way for you, my readers, to get more exposure and more followers.

With in that in mind, this means you need to comment! Yes, another reasoning to my madness is I’m looking for more of my readers to comment on my posts. Sounds crazy, right?

Hey, you help me, and I’ll help you get more followers. Commenting is a win-win situation. I even have Andy’s CommentLuv installed, too, so you can use your keywords as part of your name. If you find my posts useful, or even if you don’t, I’d love to hear about it.

So now there’s absolutely no reason not to comment.

Share your thoughts below!

Okay, this post is pretty personal, but there is a lesson here if you’re a marketer online.

Basically what happened is that one of my articles ended up on another blog. Thanks to Google Alerts I found out about. I highly recommend using Google Alerts to keep track of your name and domain name.

Anyway, what this blogger did was take my article from one of the article directories that it’s posted on and put it up on his blog. No biggie, right? Well at first I thought… “awesome, someone likes my article and wants to share it with their readers.”

Well after investigating, I find that, while the person aknowledges that I’m the author, he completely removed my resource box from the article. If you’re familiar with article marketing, you’ll know this is in violation of the author’s copyright.

This guy went even further by not only removing my links, but adding his own throughout the entire article. When I saw this I was quite irked to say the least, and still am.

Luckily (or maybe not) for me he has contact information on his site, so I emailed the owner and asked him to include a link to my site since he blatantly had removed it. Of course, I have yet to get a response. I also told him I would take further action if he didn’t comply (which seems impossible now).

I then went to Whois.com and looked up the contact information and web host for this domain. After finding out the host, it turns out you can’t contact them unless you have an account with them. How convenient, right?

I then decided to leave a comment on the page that my article is on. Well, I found out that the owner had conveniently deleted it. What’s the point of allowing comments if you’re just going to delete them anyway!

My last resort is to post about it here. People like this make me mad. They can’t come up with their own content, so they steal other people’s content and don’t give credit back by at least keeping their links. Yes, my name is there, but that’s just not enough, and it violates the terms of the article directories and the author.

You can view my article as well as check out the blogger who stole my content at http://www.getcashonline.org/work-from-home-online.

I absolutely hate thieves and hope this guy gets what he deserves. I know this problem is everywhere and can’t be avoided. It’s people like this that give the honest people a bad name.

What’s your experience with this? How did you handle it?