WordPress sites are often the victim of spam through comments, emails, forums or contact forms. The consequences could damage the comments section of your pages but also the SEO positioning of your site.
What are the consequences of spam on WordPress and how to stop it?
Leaving spam uncontrolled could affect the user experience of users visiting your site, causing:
- Loss of positions on Google : the search engine, in fact, checks not only the links on your site but also those in the comments section;
- Visitor security risk : the links nested in the comments section often lead to malicious sites, also risking viruses.
- Longer load times : Too many comments can overload the WordPress database, slowing down the site and risking a decrease in overall traffic.
How to stop spam?
Unfortunately, comment spam is inevitable and there is no way to stop it completely. To moderate it, however, you can use specially created WordPress tools.
Start by activating comment moderation: this way, it will be your job to approve all comments before they are posted on the site.
From your WordPress dashboard, go to the Settings – Discussion section by activating the settings you deem necessary to prevent spam as much as possible, for example, by manually setting the approval of the comment before it is posted or forcing the comment author to enter name and e-mail address.
Also, we recommend that you use CAPTCHAs on your forms in WordPress to prevent them from being used by bots.
Akismet: the anti-spam plugin
Akismet is an indispensable plugin, with more than 5 million installations under its belt. It is ideal for avoiding spam comments and protecting your site from malicious content. Among the main features of Akismet:
- Automatic check of all comments received, marking spam ones.
- Check if the spam tagging was done by Akismet or a moderator to get a complete overview.
- URLs are visible within the comment to instantly check for hidden or deceptive links.
Stopping spam completely is impossible but, by following these tips you can certainly stem spammy comments and prevent your site from losing SEO points.
