These days, it’s hard not to leave a comment on your fav influencer’s profile without getting a response from an imposter account asking you to message them on WhatsApp.
As a brand or creator, the last thing you want is for your followers to get scammed while trying to communicate with you. In this post, we’re covering why spam comments are dangerous for your brand and how you can de-spam your brand’s comment section.
A spam comment is any comment considered inappropriate or unwelcome. Often referred to as spomments, spam comments have nothing to do with to the original post content. They typically advertise products or prompt users to click suspicious links that could lead to scams or malware.
Monitoring your comments for spam shows your audience you care about their safety and security. It shows that you care about how your brand is presented and who it’s associated with.
Overtly spammy comments can hurt your brand’s reputation. Your audience might shy away from engaging with your content after seeing a flood of bot comments. They may even begin to question how much of your audience is legitimate and whether you take the time to monitor your account in the first place. At the very least, spam comments can leave users associating your account with a little taste of the ick.
Spammy comments might confuse the algorithm. If it believes your account is engaging with spammy users, then it won’t recommend your content to the real users that could become part of your audience.
Filtering out spam comments on social media isn’t the easiest task, but it is possible. Head to your privacy settings, click on comments, and choose to receive or block comments from individual followers. Filter out the words that often appear in spam comments. Common examples include:
Sometimes, spam comments will use typos on purpose to avoid these filters. If you notice this happening enough, consider blocking the common misspellings as well.
You’ll want to sift through your followers and delete the ones that appear fake. Your follower account will drop, but your rate of genuine engagement will rise. Keep an eye out for followers without a profile picture, content, or followers.
Some TikTok users report experiencing massive drops in reach and engagement after reporting too many spammy comments or users. While purely anecdotal, you might consider blocking the user instead of reporting them to avoid a potential shadowban.