How much weight does UGC really have in SEO

[nomad-202323]

Hi Guys....One of my sites has a blog and the site does very well overall.....however managing the blogs comments (fighting spam...attacks...general monitoring and approval) is becoming to much trouble.  The blog itself really gets fed from facebook and most of the blog comments are done here.

I am thinking of removing the comment section on the blog and only responding to facebook comments.....I am concerned though how much weight the "user generated content" carries with regards to SEO...it has always been said that it does carry weight but what if i get traffic to these pages and links but remove the comments ability...

just really wanted to hear some opinions on this and how much respect i should give UGC.

thanks for your time

[nomad-202323]

Hi Regal..thanks and agreed...I am getting good signals from sharing and likes..so am winning there...I think I am just going to quit with the comments and focus on that on the facebook page...as that is really where the bulk is  happening....I appreciate the input..thank you

cheers

[regal_kyle]

Hi Nomad,

How are your comments set up currently?  A lot of the social signal that we've seen recently comes from the sharing / "liking" features of social, not necessarily the social integration (in terms of content).

So, based on that, removing the comments won't hurt you, imo, from a social signal standpoint; but as NOC mentioned, UGC (in your case - comments on your blog) do potentially add SEO value over time, as they will be relevant to the topic on the page (hopefully), and be naturally generated as users add them.

I'd also agree with NOC about putting some additional spam filters on the comments if you haven't already, as that may help your spam issues.

Hope this helps.  Cheers.

[nomad-202323]

thanks for the input.....and yes i do believe it is of some help having UGC to enhance certain keyword densities...but does it have any strong social signals that will impact the serps?

[NerdsOnCall]

I know that comments can help long term keyword  optimization. For example: If the commenters use variations of your keywords, and partial matches of your keywords, then it can help build more organic on-page optimization.

If your blog gets a lot of spam, you can consider adding a quora style system where other users can vote for comments. Allow people to vote comments up or down.