Now Available: Disqus Polls

Today, we’re thrilled to launch Disqus Polls, a powerful new tool that enables publishers to easily create and embed interactive polls directly onto their site, boosting audience engagement and collecting valuable insights. After weeks of feedback from early adopters, we’ve fine-tuned Polls to deliver the best experience for publishers and their audiences, and now, Polls are available to everyone!

Over the years, Disqus has grown synonymous with our world-class Comment tools, used by millions of publishers around the world to engage and grow their audiences. Today, we’re taking a bold new step and giving publishers a brand-new, standalone tool that will help audiences transform audience engagement into audience enjoyment.

A new era of Disqus arrives

Disqus Polls lets publishers create dynamic polls and embed them onto their site, anywhere on any page, in minutes. Equipped with responsive design, flexible placements, and tons of customization options, Polls are custom-built to fit perfectly into all websites and are proven to deliver fun, highly-interactive experiences to audiences on all browsers and devices.

Easy setup makes creating and embedding new Polls onto your site almost effortless. With a user-friendly poll creation interface, publishers can build new Polls in less than a minute, and custom question-and-answer formats allow publishers to keep things fresh, ensuring that their audiences stay longer on the page to continue engaging. Style and branding customizations allow Polls to blend in seamlessly into the look-and-feel of any website, while additional settings + full SSO integrations let publishers require registration or login to maintain control over their first party data while securing poll integrity.

Once a publisher has created their Poll, they can embed it directly onto their site by simply pasting the poll code snippet into their page source. To keep delivering fresh Polls to your audiences without having to update your page source each time, publishers can insert Universal Tags into their page—once the Universal Tags are in place, they can keep deploying new Polls directly from their Poll Editor UI moving forward. Polls can also be placed directly on a publisher’s homepage to maximize engagement and ad revenue (for publishers using an ad-supported Polls plan—see below for pricing & plan details).

After the poll is live on the page, publishers can access real-time reporting via their Poll Analytics dashboard, which provides both poll-specific as well as cumulative insights into how your audiences are engaging with your polls. Ad-supported Polls publishers will also have access to real-time revenue reporting for a detailed look at how ad placements in the Poll module(s) are performing across their site.

Publishers are empowered to use Polls to ask their audiences all types of questions, including:

• Getting feedback on publisher content – “Do you want to see more of this type of content in the future?”
• Gaining insight into audiences’ general brand awareness and engagement – “Would you be interested in a new newsletter?”
• Tapping into audience behavior intents – “Do you plan to vote in the upcoming presidential election?”

… and anything else that a publisher would find useful! The possibilities are endless.

Publishers are already starting to take advantage of Polls to engage their audiences. Just ask Ben Koo, CEO of Comeback Media, who has been testing Polls over the last few weeks and had this to say about their experience so far:

“Disqus Polls are extremely easy to use and implement and allows us to increase engagement with our audience. We now have the ability to not only solicit feedback from our audience about news events and our content, but also monetize that feedback in a meaningful way. Increased engagement, lowering our pure display ad density, longer time on site, and higher revenue are all significantly helpful to our business and ability to serve our audience.”

How to get started with Disqus Polls today

Polls are now available to everybody—whether you’re a current Disqus customer who uses Comments, or you’re brand new to Disqus, you can get started with Polls today. Publishers who don’t need or want a comment section—or who are using a comment section from another provider—are free to purchase and enjoy Polls on its own.

As Polls is an entirely standalone product, getting access to Polls will require a separate subscription for those who already use Disqus Comments. 

There are a couple of different ways to get started with Polls:

• Try Polls for free – We offer 30-day free trials of our ad-free Polls Pro plan, which gives you access to powerful features, lets you create and install unlimited number of Polls, and comes with additional support and resources.
• Apply for the free, ad-supported Polls plan – For eligible publishers, we offer a free, ad-supported version of Polls that lets you earn a share of ad revenue generated from ad placements in the Polls module. 
• Learn more about the Polls Business plan – For publishers and media organizations who require advanced features like SSO and custom implementations, Polls for Business is your best option. Get in touch with us today to get the convo started.

To learn more about how to get started with Polls, learn more here. We've also created this handy quick start guide that should help you get up and running with Polls in no time. Questions on how to access Polls? Please contact your account manager or reach out to us directly at publisher-success@disqus.com. 

One more thing – today is just the beginning for Disqus Polls. We’re already in the process of dreaming up new features and enhancements that we’ll be rolling out in the weeks and months ahead, and we’ll be tuning into all publisher feedback to help us make Polls as impactful and valuable as we possibly can.

FAQ   

How do I access Disqus Polls?

If you’re totally new to Disqus, you can get started with Polls by heading to our Pricing Page. You’ll see different plans available for you to choose.

If you’re an existing Disqus publisher, you can either get started with Polls via our Pricing Page or you can head to your Subscription & Billing page. A reminder that for existing Disqus publishers a separate purchase is required to access Polls. You’ll need to be an Org Owner or Admin to purchase Polls for your website.

Do I need to use Disqus Comments to use Polls?

Nope! Polls are a completely separate, standalone product.

Can I purchase both Comments and Polls at the same?

No, you’ll need to purchase each separately, although we may decide to offer both products as a bundle down the road.

If I’m already on a current Disqus Comments plan and want to purchase Polls, do I need to pick the same Polls plan?

Not at all! You are free to pick whichever plan makes most sense to you for each product.

Is there a free version of Polls?

We do offer a free, ad-supported version of Polls for eligible publishers. This Polls does let you earn a meaningful share of revenue generated from ad placements within your Poll modules.

Is there a free trial?

Yes! We offer a 30-day free trial of our Polls Pro plan which comes with advanced features. You can cancel anytime.