Last Monday, the digital world was rocked as Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp all went down for an unprecedented amount of time (about 6 hours, but it felt like forever, didn't it?) due to a combination of factors involving human error as well as a code update that went awry and prevented Facebook from accessing its own data centers.

Twitter's newest feature, Communities, is set to take on Facebook Groups, Reddit, and Discord as a viable method of creating semi-exclusive, interest-based conversations.

Here at Disqus, we’re always dreaming up tools that will help our publishers boost community engagement. A highly engaged community enjoys robust returning visitor traffic and time-on-site, two crucial performance metrics that can lead to higher ad revenue and better SEO positioning.

Introducing Badges—our brand-new feature that lets you bestow special badges onto commenters who make your community a lively and engaging place.  

In a move that directly impacts publishers and their ad revenue, Google has recently announced that they’ll be replacing their Scaled Partner Management (SPM) program with Multiple Customer Management (MCM). 

When we think in broad terms about sending emails to our audience, the first concept that might come to mind involves traditional email marketing. There's certainly nothing wrong with an email marketing campaign, and in fact, your overall marketing strategy won't be successful unless you're utilizing one, but let's face it - there is absolutely more than one way to engage your audience via email.

Ensuring your commenter section reflects your site’s editorial point-of-view is critical to maintaining a safe, vibrant and growing community. It also allows you to rest easy that the content in your commenting section is safe for your advertisers. Currently, when it comes to controlling commenters on your site you have two options, roll the dice and hope for the best or manage each new comment one by one. Either way is not ideal.

Nearly ⅓ of the American population listens to podcasts at least once a month. But one key feature has been missing from podcasts - an interactive community. Pre-recorded podcasts miss the opportunity to engage with an audience in real-time.  

Digital publishers love people that notice their work - I mean, who doesn’t? There are “creators” that will create UGC for your brand. The “engagers” that will share your posts, and of course, the “commenters” that keep your online community alive. 
 

Over the last 6 weeks Facebook has both banned and reversed course on news content in Australia. This is scary! It demonstrated that publishers are at the whims of Facebook for traffic and, in turn, revenue and audience.  

Although Facebook has since reversed its decision, the message is clear: Facebook isn't always a dependable platform for publishers to reach their audience.