Image by arnold | inuyaki
Spam comes in all shapes and sizes (and apparently flavors). What happens when unsuspecting and ignorant bloggers become just that though– spammers?
A few bloggers were recently talking about the IFB forums and the growing number of new bloggers spamming people with emails that look like this:
I would like to have more followers by google connect. If you like my blog and you follow it, let me know and I will do the same for you. You can fallow my blogloving as well.
LINK
LINK
Or it may read like this:
I would like to call you to check my blog, and if you like it follow me I will love to follow u2~!Also, find me on polyvore and tumblr if You want
kisssssses
LINK
LINK
LINK
These are real messages sitting in my IFB inbox right now. Recently Eli at Thrift Eye posted an image of an email sent to her by a blogger– the blogger called herself very popular and noted that her popularity came through other blogs writing about her. Naturally she thought that Eli should write about her. People responded on twitter– she wasn’t the only one who received that email.
Self promotion is a great tool, and in many ways blogging is still like the Wild, Wild West– untamed, wild, and without rules. Sadly, this approach likely works in the short term because these bloggers will simply add one another as friends on Bloglovin. In the long-run, I don’t believe creates an interactive, vocal, or dynamic audience. As someone who works with brands, I know many companies value seeing comments over numbers– interaction is much more important to them than numbers!
There are so many resources on the IFB community (through forum rules, our current blog posts, and our extensive archives) and through social media that there’s no excuse for lazy behavior. This doesn’t mean that the blogger is bad– just misguided and a bit ignorant to how the community functions, along with the hard work required to grow your blog.
Responding to Unintentional Spammers:
It’s up to you ultimately how to interact with these people– maybe you love to check out their links and explore new blogs. Maybe you see the email in your box & groan. Maybe it fills you with a Hulk-like rage (ASHE SMASH!). No matter how you respond, maybe there are conductive ways to help them out, lead them on a better course,
- Ignore them. This has typically been my response. If they can’t be bothered to build a natural relationship with me (or even visit my own blog), why would I justify it by giving them a shred of traffic? This method doesn’t necessarily help the blogging community at large.
- Write back. I believe this idea came from Bella at Citizen Rosebud, who mentioned schooling some of these misguided fashionistas. Create a response you can send when writing back– something fast & friendly. You could write back something useful like:
Hi doll!
I know how hard it is to grow your blog, but writing messages like this is considered spam and many bloggers don’t appreciate them. In fact, many do resent them! This might be why a lot of your messages go unanswered. While I’m happy to check out your site, I do believe in genuinely building up relationships with other bloggers. So perhaps getting out there, commenting on blogs, and getting active in the community is a better way to reach people. While this may create short term growth for your site, in the long-run it’ll just alienate you from the community! I’d hate to see you stunt your growth before it can even begin! If you want more suggestions on how to grow your site, maybe check out the following articles/websites? - Provide Great Tips. When Bella wrote back to a blogger she said, “May I suggest you reach out directly to blogs you like, and introduce yourself via THEIR blogs or email. This doesn’t make me feel good, the “I’ll follow you and you follow back” message, it makes me feel like I fell into a hole and landed back in gradeschool.” This is great because it’s not only personal, but she provides suggestions on more efficient ways to get in touch with and build relationships within the blogging community.
- Share information. Ways to grow traffic aren’t a secret. There are dozens of ebooks, IFB articles, and Problogger articles on it. Keep a short list that you can attach to an email, like the following links:
Don’t Go It Alone: Relationship-Building for Bloggers
10 Realizations that Will Crush Your Little Heart Your First Year Blogging
IFB Forums: How do you get many followers/your blog noticed?
IFB Forums: How are you getting your blog noticed?
IFB Forums: How do you get people to follow your blog once they’ve visited?
IFB Forums: How to have more traffic and readers: my experience
Have you written these kinds of emails– and if so, what has the response been when you’ve sent them? Have you been on the receiving end of them– and what tends to be your response?
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So true! I’m a new member at IFB, and within the first 24 hours of being a member, I received probably around 5 emails an hour with a ‘FOLLLOOW MEEE <3' message. My approach was to thank them for welcoming me to IFB. But to be honest, it wasn't really a warm welcome. I really hope those messages stop!
I got these too and have welcomed people myself. I actually do like people to give me feedback and since I’m new to it all, I like to check out others. I really only follow the ones I like but appreciate how hard it is to network.
The small, but well written blogs are out there and looking through some mail doesn’t take too much time
Love the article though and am constantly learning through this blogging world!
Yeah me too, and I sort of didn’t know how to respond but I’m understanding that people are really eager to get their sites noticed and receive as much feedback as possible. But I myself will try and participate in as little spamming as possible. It really doesn’t hurt to check people out though and I agree with Jen above me.
-bckls
Honestly, I send these messages, but only to blogs that I think are interesting. If someone sends me one, I like them! I love to see there blogs and read them. Obviously, I don’t mean it to be like spam, but I suppose it is. I guess I should apologize for spamming you’re inboxes, but I figure networking like this is a good way to get your blog known to many other people. Sometimes commenting just isn’t enough
I dislike the follow-me-i’ll-follow-you bloggers – and usually ignore any that leave a comment like that. But I do a lot of commenting myself, and if I don’t like the outfit/blog I don’t leave a comment.
I love this article! I just joined IFB a few weeks ago and I got 3 emails – one was a nice welcome email, one was of the “follow me and I’ll follow you back” variety, but my favorite was just a “follow me” email.
I only have 3 members on my blog right now (who may or may not be married or related to me, haha) but I would rather have someone follow my blog because they actually like it and read it.
I recieve many emails to follow bloggers, a few were interesting blogs and I follow this. They no follow my blog back, only 3 persons of IFB follow me.
Am I naive if I always follow when other bloggers asks me to follow them and they don’t follow me back??
http://jassfashionlover.blogspot.com/
I think I’m or maybe I just can’t say No Or Ignore them!!
thx for the information. its very useful.
when i first read an article in IFB about how to be better blogger it said to not ask other bloggers to please follow etc since then i don’t do it. I believe if a fellow blogger likes what i write they will follow me either way
and i really only follow blogs that i really like. i think blogging should be honest. 
I have to admit, the first time I joined IFB I bumped into a lot of people saying please follow my blog blah blah blah. Well, this one girl was talking about how she badly needed followers. Well when I checked her blog she had like 400 followers! And at the time I only had 5! I was furious! It just made her look incredibly greedy! I instantly deleted the email and blocked her. Now, When I get a friend request, before I confirm, I check the their site out. If I like it and feel I can learn or be inspired by it, then I accept. Other than that its a no. Im not going to just follow you to follow you. Im going to actually add you on bloglovin’ not just follow you to make my friend que look big! I got the followers I have because I started talking to people on IFB and participating in polls etc.
Soooo true!!!!
I get a lot of them when I registered. For the first 4 I thought it was a common practice, but when i realize all the message I was getting were like this.. well I understood it was spam and I lost all my ineterest in the IFB network
When I was a new member to IFB, I got spam after spam of “follow me and i’ll follow you” msgs. I was naive and even wrote them back and followed them to be nice.
But then I unfollowed soon after since their blog/style/fashion was not in my taste or their blog was not all that interesting to me. I want people to genuinely enjoy my blog/writing, not because it is a numbers game.