But brands who decide to do away with comments sections on their blogs could find themselves in a quandary. How do you maintain a relationship with your target audience if they can't talk back to you?
It turns out that readers' relationships with brands-and blogs-are changing. There are more ways for brands to talk to their communities, and they can offer a cleaner, less dangerous experience for both the brand and its audience.
Don't euthanize-democratize
When curated carefully, comments sections can give community members a central location to engage with a brand and with each other. But when certain community members insist on posting abusive, vulgar or otherwise offensive comments, it can scare people away-or worse, encourage the kind of comment thread that can turn a blog post into the Web equivalent of a bad neighborhood.
Investing in the resources to moderate a blog can be costly, both in terms of time and money. But enlisting the help of trusted community members can be an advantage in two ways: it allows an outside, ostensibly objective party weed out the ugliness, and it gives community members ownership with the brand. Be careful, though, in choosing outside moderators-be sure they're community members you can trust. Even if they're not on your payroll, they speak for your brand.
Engage on social media
Owned media like blogs can be a great way to tell the world about your products and services, but earned media can be the best way to start and continue a dialogue with customers. There's more to social media than just Twitter and Facebook, and social media engagement can include more than just text.
Instagram, Vine and Snapchat bring can bring a new dimension to how customers interact with a brand and its products. Brands like Taco Bell and the New Orleans Saints are using Snapchat to communicate with their communities; brands can offer news and users can submit their own images. Allowing pictures to speak for your brand may carry your message much further than a simple 140 characters or a text-based status update.
Making the decision to close a comments section can be a tough one-but with the volume of content increasing ever more quickly, finding new ways to engage customers must become a priority. Explore earned media as a way to start a dialogue, and you might be able to expand your range of engagement, as well as your audience.
Image credit: @AvoidComments