Just about a month now. Traffic and engagement has increased. I'm very happy with the switch.

 

Edit to include specifics...

 

Visits +32.43%

Avg Visit Duration +12.18%

As a blog owner, having Disqus has its pros because people have to go back to your site to check on your reply, so you get more visits. With WP comments, you can be on another site and check what people answered without visiting, or you get an email with the reply.

But as a commenter I am not a fan and feel that if I took commentluv and site links down, people wouldn't comment that much. Unless you leave a link to your site on the comment, and risk being considered a spammer, people can't easily track you back.

Edit to include specifics...

Visits +32.43%

Avg Visit Duration +12.18%

I'm not a fan of Disqus when I want to leave comments on other people's sites, but I'll find a way to comment if I have something to say, esp since a lot of blogs use it.

LaTisha @YoungFinances said:

Most comments are no follow anyway so unless you are the first commenter no one is reading your comment or clicking through your link. You can check your G Analytics for that. But with Disqus you get the most recent comment at the top with keeps the conversation going. Engagement in 2013.

Actually, the top two referrers to my site are both blogs that I comment on heavily.  Both give me more traffic than Google!

I also see pretty good traffic from some larger blogs that I comment on somewhat regularly. Its not a main source of traffic, but its not negligible either. 

But on the other hand search traffic is important because if you are under 100,000 page views a day, then you do not have an audience large enough to justify direct traffic only.

If your top two referrers are other websites and your traffic is relatively low (below 10k uniques per month) then yes, I would agree that you should focus more on getting search traffic.

So far I haven't gotten any complaints with the new system and I seem to be getting return visitors when they're notified that someone has replied. Also, if you set up your profile with your link people can still click through to your site.

Eric J. Nisall said:

LaTisha @YoungFinances said:

Eric J. Nisall said:

Yeah, but there isn't a place for commenters to input their website and have it link to their name.  If you downgrade away from the 2012 update, you'll get that functionality back, at at the same time you lose all of the fancy new features so it's a catch-22.

The 'discovery box' was really what sold me back into Disqus. I had it before but removed it after complaints. But this snazzy new box that claims to increase engagement, well I'm all over that. Plus if a reader that is not a blogger wants to comment they won't have a problem with the link issue. I personally don't have a problem with it either. Most comments are no follow anyway so unless you are the first commenter no one is reading your comment or clicking through your link. You can check your G Analytics for that. But with Disqus you get the most recent comment at the top with keeps the conversation going. Engagement in 2013.

 

The engagement factor is exactly why I leave comments; if I have nothing to say other than "great article" or whatever, I don't bother.  If I get a link back, fine.  If I get a "follow" link, even better.  But I'm more interested in engaging with people, which is probably why my comments sometimes look more like mini-articles.   

 

LaTisha @YoungFinances said:

Most comments are no follow anyway so unless you are the first commenter no one is reading your comment or clicking through your link. You can check your G Analytics for that. But with Disqus you get the most recent comment at the top with keeps the conversation going. Engagement in 2013.

Actually, the top two referrers to my site are both blogs that I comment on heavily.  Both give me more traffic than Google!

I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing 

Eric J. Nisall said:

Yeah, but there isn't a place for commenters to input their website and have it link to their name.  If you downgrade away from the 2012 update, you'll get that functionality back, at at the same time you lose all of the fancy new features so it's a catch-22.

The 'discovery box' was really what sold me back into Disqus. I had it before but removed it after complaints. But this snazzy new box that claims to increase engagement, well I'm all over that. Plus if a reader that is not a blogger wants to comment they won't have a problem with the link issue. I personally don't have a problem with it either. Most comments are no follow anyway so unless you are the first commenter no one is reading your comment or clicking through your link. You can check your G Analytics for that. But with Disqus you get the most recent comment at the top with keeps the conversation going. Engagement in 2013.

 

The engagement factor is exactly why I leave comments; if I have nothing to say other than "great article" or whatever, I don't bother.  If I get a link back, fine.  If I get a "follow" link, even better.  But I'm more interested in engaging with people, which is probably why my comments sometimes look more like mini-articles.   

Most comments are no follow anyway so unless you are the first commenter no one is reading your comment or clicking through your link. You can check your G Analytics for that. But with Disqus you get the most recent comment at the top with keeps the conversation going. Engagement in 2013.

Actually, the top two referrers to my site are both blogs that I comment on heavily.  Both give me more traffic than Google!

Yeah, but there isn't a place for commenters to input their website and have it link to their name.  If you downgrade away from the 2012 update, you'll get that functionality back, at at the same time you lose all of the fancy new features so it's a catch-22.

The 'discovery box' was really what sold me back into Disqus. I had it before but removed it after complaints. But this snazzy new box that claims to increase engagement, well I'm all over that. Plus if a reader that is not a blogger wants to comment they won't have a problem with the link issue. I personally don't have a problem with it either. Most comments are no follow anyway so unless you are the first commenter no one is reading your comment or clicking through your link. You can check your G Analytics for that. But with Disqus you get the most recent comment at the top with keeps the conversation going. Engagement in 2013.

I haven't changed my comment system on FS for 3.5 years and so far, so good. Might not be the prettiest, but it's good enough and the only inquiries is when a comment goes to spam.

Sam