Spam and Comments on Blogs
Today I visited a blog to which I would have posted a comment, but I couldn’t get through the gauntlet to register as a legitimate reader.
Spammers are a real problem with blogs. A great feature of blogs is being able to join the conversation by posting comments to any article on the blog. Unfortunately, the spammers flood most blogs with nonsense links to Viagra, porn and assorted other junk.
On this site, in order to comment on a post, you must first file a registration form from the home page, and then once that is completed, you must answer 6 questions before you can write a comment. Most casual visitors don’t have time to search for and learn all these steps in order to help someone out with a suggestion.
When too many barriers are present, we just move on.
The good news is that technology can be a huge help in managing spam. Some software has tools to help with spam that remain in the background, so no burden is put on readers. After the experience on this blog, I would rank this as a top priority for all business blogs.
Here’s where I’ve learned the power of using WordPress, the software that powers this site. This software takes quite a bit of work to learn as it is intended for professionals. I spent three weeks wrestling with it before having modest success and hiring help for the last few features I couldn’t create on my own.
One of the features available with WordPress is a spam filter that is quite excellent. I discard several hundred spam posts each week, after a quick scan to be sure it didn’t capture a legitimate post.
If your company is considering using blogging software, be a hero and forward this post so they can see the difference in user experience.
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