Finally decided to switch over to Facebook Comments box. I'm using this plugin and there were quite a bit of modifications required on my theme. You have to disable and hide Wordpress own commenting system and make sure the theme is using Facebook comments count. Before you take the jump and move your blog over to use Facebook comments, here's some pros and cons to consider.
Pros
- Integrated with Facebook. Comments can easily be posted on Facebook to increase views and publicity. You also get the cool Facebook Insights stats.
- You'll get comments from actual people with their name and photo. Makes it easier to figure out who is who.
- Less spam. Well, there are spammers on Facebook but definitely less than those annoying spam bots.
Cons
- Not exactly easy to setup. Might require some knowledge in HTML/CSS/PHP.
- No longer integrated with Wordpress Comments. Meaning you won't be managing your comments from your Wordpress admin site.
If you are planning to use Facebook Comments, you have to create an app on Facebook and set it up to point to your blog. The settings page for the plugin have all the information you need to get started.
You may also need to modify some of these files to hide the existing commenting system and change how the comments count are displayed.
- comments.php
- single.php
- index.php
Here's the comments count code.
<a href="<?php echo the_permalink() ?>#comments"><fb:comments-count href=<?php echo the_permalink() ?> /></fb:comments-count> Comments</a>
Depending on the theme you are using, this can be really simple or quite a task. On Flexnode Blog, there were more modifications required on the theme functions and the styling of the comments area. If you need any help, leave a comment below.