Spam Blocking vs Comments?

bySailorblue

195 followers

8 years ago

I am off to google Plus to look at posts, leave comments and find new things. I start at the Share your Google Accounts thread and settle in. I have read a lovely article and am ready to leave a comment because, no one else has yet and, I am here.

Then it hits me, she has DISQUS. It wants me to sign up, log in, it is to much trouble. She’s trying to prevent spam, her site must be huge, I’m moving on. I don’t want to be forced into jumping through all of those hoops to leave a comment!

I know what your thinking, you have to leave your email on every site anyway right? Yes but, leaving the page, going to another site, taking on another stupid membership that will send me junk mail I don’t want, is a total pain in the butt. Right or wrong that’s what I am thinking.

Is it really worth it, for a new website, to use this kind of a plug in? I have a father who is paranoid about being followed by “them” online. I have no idea who would be interested in spying on him, but honestly, his friends worry about stuff like that! My point is, that Dad would never stick around to comment, if it meant doing all of this. He does like to comment on what he reads though.

How much are you losing when you make it hard for people to comment on your site?

Six months ago, it would never have occurred to me to leave a comment on someone’s site unless the content really pissed me off. Sites offering reviews are great, never once left a comment, ever. I don’t read the comments either. Ouch!

With all this in mind, I am going to take the time to design an effective hook, asking people to post. Something like…

“Support my site. When you leave comments, Google ranks my site higher and more people will find this great content. Tell me what you think, good or bad, I want to hear from you”

I’m going to go back to every single post that I have to add it in above the comments section.

If people had educated me about the value of comments, I would have started commenting years ago as my way of supporting good sites.

I will not make it harder for people to comment on my posts unless; at some point in the future, I have a real spamming problem. The “I am not a robot thing” looks way less invasive and complicated. Just saying…

What do you think? What works on your site?