Facebook Comments: Good or Bad for Your Business?

Facebook is in the news yet again. The world’s leading social network last week updated its comment widget to allow personalized chats on third-party websites. Facebook says the free plugin will make life easy for publishers to add Facebook-themed commenting functionality to their websites.

As with any Facebook feature, there are mixed reactions on whether the new comment widget is – good, bad or neutral, especially for business users. Here’s my take on it.

How does Facebook Comment Plugin work?

Anonymous comments can often be rude, abusive and unpleasant. Facebook says it updated the Comments Box Plug-in, which links comments made on third party websites to a member’s Facebook account, to encourage personal and relevant conversations. The move is expected to minimize spam comments as it signals the end of anonymity.

Implications

Anonymity isn’t bad, but it’s heavily overused and abused in the social media world. Of course, the most obvious implication of this change is that users will be forced to think twice before they comment on any site. Therefore, a huge drop in number of comments can’t be ruled out.

TechCrunch adopted the Facebook comment plugin and observed the overall number of comments have fallen dramatically. While TechCrunch says it’s expected and “not a bad thing”, it may have serious implications for a business which thrives on traffic redirection and comments with inbound links.

The obvious benefit is that you get quality comments. There would be a decline in the number of useless comments.

Pros & Cons

TechCrunch team has done a wonderful job of highlighting the pros and cons of the new Facebook comments plugin. As expected, the benefits include a reduction in number of trolls, tighter integration with Facebook and the ability to socialize comments through Facebook “likes” feature.

The biggest disadvantage being the comments plugin does not work with Google and Twitter credentials. There are other issues as well – it compromises privacy as people may find their replies in your Facebook News stream reproduced on another site’s comments – not exactly a pleasant surprise. Further, if Facebook is blocked due to access restrictions, your site’s comments system falls flat.

It’s understandable that Facebook left out Twitter and Google on purpose. While the former is its closest competitor in social media, the latter is not in friends list. However, that accounts for a massive proportion of the daily web traffic and there’s no doubt that it will hurt the wide scale adoption of this plugin.

Good, bad or neutral?

Coming back to the original question – is the new Facebook comment plugin good, bad or neutral for your business? Do the pros outweigh the cons or vice-versa? IMO, there’s no one size fits all solution here. If your website gets quality anonymous comments, I see no reason to block them with this plugin. On the other hand, if your site is plagued with spam due to anonymous comments, the Facebook comments plugin is a blessing in disguise for your business.

Do you plan to use the Facebook comments plugin for moderating your website users? Please share your opinion by leaving a comment below this post.

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  1. I couldn’t be more against Facebook comments than I already am, honestly.
    It’s not about anonimity, I always comment with my real name and last name as you know, but, I simply don’t have a Facebook account. And I don’t intend to make one. The only account I have is a service account, with a fake name (it’s against the policy I know, but I don’t really care) that I use to admin some pages, and that’s about it.
    I frankly never had a use for Facebook and for sure commenting won’t be one that will move me to use it, so I don’t really understand why any blog would want to implement just that way of accepting user’s feedback. Adding the chance for FB people to comment, fine, having it as the ONLY method, not so.

    1. That’s one of the biggest con to the system for me. There’s limitation to who can leave comments and for the fact that Facebook is the #1 blocked sites in most work places, would limit a site’s commenting reach.

      Thanks for another awesome take on this post Gabriele.

  2. I think there are a few factors that make Facebook comments a bad move for most people: quite a few businesses do block Facebook; as Gabriele mentioned, not everyone has a Facebook account; for some people, there is that privacy issue (I want my opinion to be heard, but I don’t want to be harassed).

    For me: I have a Facebook account, but I do NOT use my personal profile for any sort of business. I already have business contacts who want to friend me on Facebook and it’s just not happening, sorry. I keep business completely out of my personal profile, and I’d like to keep it that way. Commenting on a blog site from that profile could open me up to friend requests that, quite frankly, I don’t want.

  3. Here is how I look at it:

    Facebook is convenient. MOST people won’t bother to fill out a little form (even if it is just a name and email).

    With facebook comments, you can easily capture the comments of who would be too lazy in the first place.

    But there is a downside, too. Facebook comments don’t get indexed! I think the same goes for the Disqus comment system which you are using at the moment. I had it before but decided against it for the very reason.

    THERE is A SOLUTION!

    You can have both like on my blog at:

    http://www.imlabz.com

    Ryan Deiss also has the same thing. I am trying to figure out how to get them “tabbed” so it doesn’t take up so much vertical space though 😉

    – Dean

  4. Although I have a Facebook page, I prefer LinkedIn for professional networking which sets a boundary between professional colleagues and my pals and relatives. Blogging is set up differently and is not done randomly and anonymously.

    If you are wondering if Facebook is the right place to market your businesses, I’d like to share my thoughts with you on this topic.

    After doing research on marketing on “social networking sites” I am now differentiating between “LinkedIn” which include professional contacts and “Facebook” which include my relatives and pals.

    I have not let clients or employees as sub-contractors or vendors “friend me” on my personal Facebook page and I never will.

    As an alternative to my personal Facebook website, a few weeks ago, I opened a Facebook page for my business. Facebook limits business pages to only likes and comments and it does not have the capabilities of a regular personal site.
    When I opened the page, it felt odd to ask personal Facebook contacts to “like” my business with the intention of getting more business. In actuality this would not include my client base or potential clients as I chose to have a private profile.

    This is where I discovered how unimportant Facebook is to my business and marketing plan because I prefer to keep my information private.

    In this manner, I fail to see the importance of my personal Facebook site in relation to increasing my business. (By all means, we can each buy ad space that will pop up while logged in to Facebook, but that’s different).

    I feel strongly about setting a boundary between professional and personal relationships on internet sites.
    Facebook doesn’t let you do this easily.
    For example, I felt shy posting my daughter’s prom pictures knowing potential clients (strangers) might someday have access to these. On the flip side of this, when I posted dialogue regarding our anti-legislative interior design efforts on “Facebook,” it felt awkward that my retired eighty-year old uncle from Missouri would have to possibly see these details of Illinois State’s legislative information that has nothing to do with his life.

    I understand that businesses have tried to exploit the exponential popularity of Facebook to market goods and services.
    However, Facebook wasn’t set up for a professional atmosphere.
    Because once a Facebook account is opened to the public setting, (and if contacts don’t have private accounts) anyone can see pictures of my niece’s newborn son and the posts my son makes about how much he likes Mountain Dew Soda.

    These types of personal posts have no impact on how I run my business or of value in attracting new clients.

    So in turn, I’m using LinkedIn as an alternative.

    Hoping this information is of value to you if you are deciding on which internet sites will work for your business and the value of third party blogging from your internet site to Facebook.
    Elizabeth Bennett, Interior Designer and Admin Manager for several websites

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