Spam is a problem that plagues many websites—and your travel blog is no exception.
What makes spam so dangerous? Usually, it's going to be links that are directed at some illegitimate website that's part of a phishing scam.
This link could be embedded in a comment on a post you made, or it might even be inserted directly into the code of your website if you have been hacked.
So what happens when people click on these links? The most common result is that they will be taken to another site where their computer is infected with malware.
But even if this doesn't happen, the link could still impact your search engine rankings and drive down traffic to your blog. It might even make it so that the comments section of your blog gets shut down by Google!
That's why an anti-spam plugin for WordPress is essential for any travel blog. It can help keep those malicious links from appearing on your site in the first place—or at least make sure they quickly get deleted after they're posted.
Millions of spam comments are posted every day
Millions of spam comments are posted every day, and it’s definitely not the best for your blog. Imagine waking up in the morning and opening up your WordPress admin panel to find thousands of spam comments waiting for moderation. You know, from some guy called “viagra_online” who has a new post on his blog that you just have to read because he learned something so valuable that he wants to share it with you.
Well, it seems to me that we don’t need these types of posts on our blogs at all.
One thing I can recommend is using an anti-spam plugin like Cleantalk Spam Protect. This plugin is easy to install and blocks thousands of spam comments without requiring too much attention from you (just activate the plugin). Plus, it works with contact forms as well which makes it a very useful tool if you want more time playing with your kids or traveling the world!
Spam comments make your blog look untidy and unsafe
Spam comments make your blog look untidy and unsafe. These will be comments like “I really liked this post” or “Very informative article” without any other text.
This also gives the impression to readers that you don't care about your site, which is not good for your site's reputation.
If you have a lot of spam comments, then it can also slow down your site and eat up more database space – which may mean that you need to pay more to your host.
In general, using an anti-spam plugin will keep away 99% of the spam comments from reaching your database at all. This means that they are never saved in WordPress as a comment and so they won't take up any space on your database – it's win-win!
Spam comments are reducing your site's speed
As the owner of your site, you should care about things that reduce its performance, including spam comments.
Having a huge number of spam comments can make your site load slowly, which can hurt your search engine rankings and cause people to give up on your site entirely before it loads.
In addition to causing slower loading times, spam comments often require server resources to process and store them. The more spam comments you have in moderation, the more resources are required to operate your site smoothly and without crashing.
Spam comments make it harder for readers to read your content
Not only does spam make your site look untidy and unsafe for readers, it can also make it harder for search engines to index your content. Search engines keep track of how fast you remove spam comments from your site—if you don’t remove them, they assume that you are okay with the presence of spam and will penalize your website with a lower Google ranking.
That means not only do you have to spend time sorting through a bazillion comments, but that spending time doing that instead of publishing content negatively impacts your rankings, which in turn impacts the amount of traffic coming to your website.
Cleantalk is the best anti-spam plugin for you
I recommend Cleantalk, which protects your site from spam and malware. It starts at $8/year, works on a pay-as-you-go plan, and may be one of the best investments you make in your blog. We deem this plugin an essential tool! The benefits of using Cleantalk are endless:
- It's easy to install and set up
- Much cheaper than similar services
- Customer support is available 24/7 for all plans
Looking for more information about Cleantalk? Check out this article
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