When you post a comment on most blogs, your blog gets linked in your name. Does this count as a backlink or do you have to actually put the link in the comment itself?
But search engines require relevent anchor texts for a linkback to be given proper credit. For example,a web hosting blog with "cheap web hosting" will be more appropriate than "Mr.x" as anchor text
Yes, it is considered valid backlink. Even trackbacks are considered as valid backlinks. So go comment more and link more. What goes around comes around eh?
The problem is most blogs do not allow keyword as name in their blog comments. Best way to do is by doing this "Name-Keyword" or "Name | Keyword" like this.
I think if you try not to take the piss(!) and make it a regular thing to comment on certain blogs, then you can get away with a straight keyword. Otherwise, I agree!
Personally, I have no problem with people using proper anchor text on their names when commenting on my blog (SpicaCasts.com). If the post is good and relative, i'll post it regardless as does most other webmasters I would imagine.
I agree, both people who post comments and me, as an owner of a blog, should benefit from the comment. They get quality links, I get their opinion. All are happy =)
You don't have to put the link in the comment. Just place the link in the link box. Also, check whether the blog is dofollow. Because only dofollow links will be indexed in google, unless you don't mind of getting indexed in yahoo (yahoo index nofollow links too)
It still count as valid backlinks, but since the anchor text is not the proper KW, the weight of that backlink is less compare to backlinks with appropriate anchor text.
Any link is a backlink! A nicely anchored link from a RELEVANT site to your niche will have more weight than a random link from a random site, but even a random link will help you as no matter what kind of link it is the search engines will follow it if they see it, giving some credit or a little help in indexing.
The answer to your question is yes. However some blog owners do remove the do-follow tag from blog comments. (Something worth to check before you post. May i point to my do-follow blog (wich is totally do-follow)?