On June 2nd of this year, my inbox pulled in an email with a link to an article with this headline: “Your Comment System Is Killing Your Discussions and Community Building Efforts.” I was immediately intrigued for two reasons. One, it was written by Sam for the Yakezie network which I had most recently joined. I love Sam’s writing and the ideas he puts forth so naturally I was going to read.
I also was interested because I was using the DISQUS commenting system on my blog at the time. I had installed that at the very beginning of Luke1428.com after doing some reading about how to monitor the comment section of a blog. DISQUS was promoted in the literature I read as being a system that 1) helped block spam, 2) raised the quality of conversation by weeding out gutter-trash commenters, and 3) provided options for monetization if the user wanted to go that route. Plus it was being used by several well-respected and highly trafficked blogs I was reading at the time. So I thought if it’s good enough for the bigwigs it’s good enough for me.
But I suspected Sam had an ulterior motive for preaching against comment systems. A few weeks prior to his post, we had an email exchange one day because he couldn’t log on to DISQUS at my site and make a comment on one of my posts. After several emails we eventually got it worked out and he left a comment. But I was frustrated one of my users had to go through that mess just to comment and I’m sure he was a tiny bit annoyed as well.
So I figured when I clicked to read the article that DISQUS and all other third party comment systems would be skewered. I was right.
In general, Sam’s main argument for abandoning comment systems is that they put up a wall to engagement in that a potential user has to register with the system to comment. They must keep track of their username and password at all times if they want to join the discussion. Many people will balk at that request, refuse to comment and thus the discussion and community building efforts are hindered.
Sam admitted to me in response to my comment on that post that his observations were anecdotal, based solely on his own experience. So I decided to run an experiment to put some data behind his observations. Perhaps then I could find out if DISQUS had actually been hurting my community building efforts.
On July 12th, I scrapped my DISQUS commenting system in favor of the traditional WordPress commenting platform. All the original comments transferred over without problem. The only addition I made to the system was adding the CommentLuv plugin, which allows other bloggers to leave a link to their most recent post when they comment on your article.
Notable Observations From My Experiment
Four months and 57 posts later here is what I’ve found:
1. Total Comments are flat, sort of. There are a total of 1,366 comments (which includes my own) from the 57 posts I’ve published since I discontinued using DISQUS. The prior 57 posts before scrapping DISQUS generated 1,360 total comments. Both average out to 24 comments per post.
Initially this looks like a wash but I feel it can be explained by looking deeper at what I’ve been doing at Luke1428 the last four months. I’ve published eight guest posts on other sites. Even though I linked to that article on my blog, those posts drew no comments at my site. All the comments were at the site that hosted my post. Based on my average comments per post, I could easily have added 200 more comments to the 1,366 total had I published those articles on my site.
In addition, I’ve had nine posts on my site that were written by a guest. While quality articles, for the most part guest posts produce less interaction in the comment section due to the fact they are not written by the site owner. I’ve only had one that drew above average comments. So I could conservatively estimate in another 100 total comments had I written my own post on the days those guest posts were scheduled.
Finally, I think comments are flat because I haven’t been as engaged myself with commenting on other blogs the last two months. Consequently, bloggers who reciprocate on comments haven’t been coming as much to Luke1428, thus reducing overall comments.
2. Comments per page view are down. Comments per page view are down from 1 comment per 16 page views in the four months prior to dropping DISQUS to 1 in 23 page views in the four months prior. I see this as a good development however, as it means more users have been coming to my site. I don’t see another issue relating to comment systems to extract out of this statistic.
3. New blogger engagement is up. A quick scan through my comment filter in WordPress shows me that I’ve had approximately 15 new bloggers come on in the past 4 four months and stick as a regular commenter (regular being someone who comments once a week). Without even looking I know I didn’t have that many in the previous four months.
Again, it’s hard to pin this one on the comment system itself. This could be due to many factors outside the scope of the comment system including the growth of my site, new bloggers starting their own sites, and bloggers wanting to utilizing the CommentLuv plugin to drive traffic to their site. So I can’t conclusively pin this development on having an open system, even though the uptick in new bloggers commenting coincided with the switch.
4. Non-blogger engagement is up. This is the development I’m most excited about. I have people now leaving comments who don’t have a blog. With DISQUS I almost never had non-blogger comments. Now, on posts where I hit my average comment number, at least 1-2 of those comments is from someone who is just a reader. It’s still a small number but a positive development and a step in the right direction to building a broader community that doesn’t rely solely on bloggers to drive the comment section.
5. An uptick of spam has filtered through. This is the development I’m least happy about. Coupling DISQUS with a spam filter plugin created a barrier where no spam would trickle through. Now using only the Akismet spam filter plugin, I have 1-2 a day that find their way to the comment section of an article.
Granted that’s a miniscule percentage based on the nearly 2,000 spam hits a day that Akismet blocks on my site. And it’s not difficult to track them down and delete them. I simply go into the “Comments” section of my WordPress dashboard and scroll through until I find one. It takes three minutes max per day to find and delete them. It is another task though I’ve had to add to my daily regimen to keep the site free of spam.
6. My general observations are positive. My feeling is that the four-month experiment has been productive and highlighted some issues I hadn’t considered before.
The look of the standard system is appealing on my site – simple, clean and obvious how to use.
I like how comments and replies are nested within one another, making it easier to see who is responding to whom.
I like the fact I have one less plugin to manage in my dashboard (having deleted the DISQUS plugin).
The system also has an advantage of DISQUS in that it presents a more intuitive way to be redirected to a blogger’s home page by simply clicking on their call name at the top of their comment.
I also like the opportunity to give back to other bloggers in the community via the CommentLuv plugin (DISQUS did not support that). Anyway I can connect my readers to other quality bloggers in the personal finance space is a clear advantage in my book.
And contrary to what I had read, I have not had my site overrun by gutter-trash commenters. The civility and usefulness of the dialogue has remained in tack for which I am grateful.
Did I Prove Sam’s Theory?
Change isn’t always necessary. My personality is such that I really need a concrete reason to change. Just because someone says I should is not reason enough. That’s why I went through this, to convince myself there was an alternative avenue that was better. I needed the evidence to help me back up a decision to change.
So did I prove Sam’s theory? I’m not 100% sure. At the least you could say the comment system experiment was a wash based on total number of comments. However, after considering all the factors involved I see it definitely trending in validation of everything he initially wrote about.
I won’t be going back to DISQUS…not because I hate it or refuse to comment on someone’s site that has it. I just like what I have now so much better and I think it’s moving me in the right direction.
What comment system are you using? Have you ever had issues leaving a comment using DISQUS? How do you decide to make a change even though the thing you are doing might be working fine? Do you need to prove things to yourself before making a change or will you simply go with someone’s advice?
About the author: Brian Fourman is a former private school personal finance and Bible teacher now turned stay at home dad and blogger. You can now openly comment on his blog at Luke1428.com or connect with him on Facebook, Google+ and Twitter.
One of my strongest blogging principles has been against a commenting system. Disqus was so bad for awhile that I would rename blogs in my RSS feed to note that they had Disqus, and would generally avoid clicking into their articles to leave a comment because of my distaste for Disqus. I also find that sometimes Disqus simply doesn’t load for me. Whether it’s something on my PC, my firewall, or whatever, the point is that if you have users who are unable to participate not only because of the user ID requirements but because of the technical restrictions, it is even more of a turnoff. I’ve never had the plain old WordPress commenting system fail to load on any site.
Thanks for sharing your results.
Looking back on it I believe I had DISQUS technical issues (similar to the ones you mention) that I didn’t realize were DISQUS technical issues. I don’t really see any huge benefits to it anymore. Interestingly enough, some of those big blogs I mentioned following who used DISQUS have moved on to new systems as well.
Fascinating experiment Brian. I bet if the content “quality/type” was the same during the 4 month experiment you’d have much more comments.
Like you, I really enjoy receiving comments from readers who don’t have blogs. I think both are great, but non blog readers engaging is the ultimate litmus test for engagement.
Regular commenters will come and go and I think great content will trump Comment Walls, but making commenting accessible to all is a no brainer!
I agree on the quality of content changing. That was definitely a variable that impacted the results.
It was great seeing non-bloggers comment. I love interacting with my blogging friends but seeing regular readers really gave me a boost in spirit. I even had some people I personally know (locally) comment which never happens. BTW, why is it that friends and family never seem to comment?
Because they are secretly judging us and can’t believe we’d actually write, and share so much about our lives!
[…] Click the following link to read my post at Yakezie: “My 4-Month Experiment Not Using a Comment System – Was It Effective?” […]
I have been a long time user of Disqus, but after reading this post, I am willing to give the default WordPress commenting system another try. Honestly, I didn’t give it a whole lot of use in my past blogs anyway, always opting to install Disqus from the start. But, I can see where using a third-party system – where logging in is required – is a net negative.
Sometimes, the default is best. :)
That is awesome you got rid of Discus! I have never had much luck at all leaving comments on Discus blogs b/c even though I have an account it never seems to work. I totally think you made the right move and now I can leave comments on your blog too!
Great!…c’mon to the site. You are more than welcome to comment. :)
Interesting experiment. DISQUS is probably the least favourite of the commenting platforms and I too have had problems with the never-ending loading screen.
I avoided it on my own site and went with commentluv which I much prefer (both hosting and using on other people’s sites).
I’m curious as to why more bloggers don’t utilize CommentLuv. Seems like a natural way to drive engagement and give back to the community. From what I understand the links are “nofollow” so bloggers taking advantage of your platform to seek link juice for their articles shouldn’t be a concern. Just not sure what the downside is.
I used to have the CommentLuv plugin until it stopped working. I tried reinstalling, but still didn’t work, and I gave up.
The only downside is that it may slow the site down, allow for another pathway for hackers, and create clutter. The ideal world is a site with 0 plugins. But that’s never going to be the case.
I’m a new blogger and I personally have wanted to leave a comment on some posts I’ve seen, but haven’t because of DISQUS. There’s no easy option for me to sign up and it seems like a hassle.
I still have my account active with Disqus because some blogs I frequent still use it. In defense, I’ve never had much of a problem leaving a comment once my account was set up. But you highlighted the big issue Emily, which is why I ultimately moved on.
I was happy when you got rid of disqus, Brian. :) I was very resistant at first to even commenting on sites with disqus because I didn’t want to have to go through the work of signing up for something I had no interest in joining. But because enough bloggers I like had the system, I eventually did. But I’ll be honest, if I wasn’t a blogger too, I would never have done it or commented on a site with disqus. And to me that’s where you’ve seen and will continue to see the biggest results is getting your every day reader to comment, which is a huge victory to me.
“…resistant at first to even commenting on sites with disqus…” I’m so glad you did though. Thanks for overlooking my flaws :) It’s been great getting to know and interact with you the last few years.
I’ve used the wordpress commenting system since day one and have never had an issue. I don’t think I’ve run into an issue with Disqus on other sites. I’m adding commentLuv, just keep forgetting to do so.
Envious of your comment traffic Brian but I guess its a function of how much time and work you’ve put into the site. I’ve only just started and have always used the WP comment with commentLUV so don’t have much to compare.
Haha…It wasn’t always like that Joseph. At first there was no one commenting. I didn’t get comments to speak of for at least the first three months. What ultimately drove it was me consistently going to other sites and commenting there. That was time consuming but necessary to get your name out there.
I do about half my comments on my iPhone (nursing or rocking a baby) – and I’m sure folks notice the typos. But I digress. It’s a pain and a half to login to DISQUS on my phone. And it’s even worse going through Bloglovin. I still leave comments in DISQUS, but only if the article was extremely thought-provoking or I feel the need to support the blogger. Otherwise, I read and skip the comments.
I have checked the option to require a new commentor to have their comment moderated first. That means no spam gets on the blog :-)
Mobile devices are not great for commenting. I try to do as little of that as possible and when I do it’s usually with my iPad.
i really dislike (dare I say hate) DISQUS. One of my closest blogging friends has it and I’ll comment there, but otherwise I will read and avoid the comment section. The other thing I’d be concerned about with DISQUS is that you don’t “own” or “host” the comments as far as I know, so they could be wiped out – much less likely to effect your comments if you use straight up WP.
Your mention of commentluv made me realize I used to have it, but at some iteration it disappeared from my plugin list… Hmm.
“…you don’t “own” or “host” the comments…” Right…I didn’t understand that until I read Sam’s original article.
I’ve never had DISQUS, but I must admit that I find it very user-unfriendly. I still comment, but I do prefer wordpress, especially since I don’t have to remember a password. Also,I don’t like the word puzzles in some sites. I wish everyone had wordpress. Pass it on! :)
When it comes to my blog – or most of the things I do where I want a response of some kind – I’ll try and do it as easy and straight forward as possible. Anything people have to go through a lot of fuff with is likely to discourage participation. I know. Some commenting systems have discouranged me as well; one is DISQUS, Another one is the captcha: I’m not sure I want to re-enter garbled signs three four time so that I can comment on some one’s blog. Wand before anyone says it, it has nothing to do with how good the article is and how genuine my reaction to it.
Agreed Maria…please no captcha. Sometimes I can’t interpret those and have to reset them until I hit a readable combination.
I really dislike Disqus from a user perspective because I always seem to get logged out and then have to remember what my login is in order to post my comment-which I loathe!! If I were a regular reader and not a blogger I would just move on to another blog. I do have a spam problem on my blog so I’m trying to figure out what to do about that…it’s getting annoying.
Since 2013 I stopped using a blog commenting system for my blog. I also used Disqus that time and the reason I decided to take if off is users should sign up first for a Disqus account before they can join the discussion. It’s a process that I think will discouraged readers to put their comment even if they want to.
Great article and good for you, Brian, for methodically testing your decision to drop Disqus. I’m not a fan of any system that hinders commenting. Some blogs force you to use a Facebook or Twitter login or use hard-to-decipher Captcha images that can also be counter-productive. Here’s to year of rich, relevant comments for all of us in the new year!