How can we get notified and respond to blog comments?

[KateShore]

There was another discussion about this marked as solved by accident, and people are still posting in there. In case the shopify team does not look at ones that are resolved I am starting a new one.

The two main issues:
-we need to be notified when someone comments on a blog post
-we need to be able to respond to comments through our admin

Everyone please keep posting on THIS thread to see if we can get more traction on this

Thanks!

[Jakob2]

Thanks for reposting. This is a must have feature. I certainly hope Shopify respons’s to this soon.

[ToneFox]

Yes please!  This seems like a basic functionality that should be included, especially in Shopify +.  We shouldn't have to pay for an additional app to be able to reply to our customers and blog page visitors.  Please respond with a timeline. 

[pjmmpls]

Oh perfect! Yes please update me on the status of this big problem. We need to interact with customers, and should not have to buy an app to do it!

[krhodes]

Does anyone know the fix for showing more than a couple of comments on each blog post. Mine only shows the first few comments, then you have to page through to see more comments.

[Eliz_MatchaAlt]

Reposting my comment from the old closed thread:

I'd like to add my voice to this request - please PLEASE please add this basic functionality as soon as possible. It's not reasonable to expect your Shopify customers to pay extra to reply to blog comments. This is 2020, and something that shouldn't be too hard to fix, but will make a big difference to all of us merchants (your customers!!). Thank you.

https://matcha-alternatives.myshopify.com/admin

https://matchaalternatives.com/

[davidbayard]

Yes, this is most frustrating. I came in asking the same question all of you are asking! I see one comment from two days ago. It is indeed silly to not have this simple feature. I tried commenting myself on the front end to a blog post, but it looks silly. Come on up to date, Shopify!!!

[kristiinam]

Here for the same problem! Strange that in 2020 this essential feature is missing from Shopify. I am more and more thinking of changing the platform...

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[TJGator]

Come on Shopify this is an easy one.

[dhuratadavies]

Ugh!!! Thank you... I've been struggling with this for ages! This seems like such a basic thing to have on a blog. Does anyone from Shopify even read this? If they do, they really need to fix such a simple problem. I just need to be able to respond to customer questions posted on my blog. I don't actually know any other blogs that don't have this feature included. Very frustrating. Kept thinking it's me not doing something right... I'm fed up with all the extra apps needed.

[davidbayard]

So, just to let you know, I am going to call Shopify on the phone to find out what the peeps on the street know about this. BUT...know in the meantime you CAN reply to folks' comments, though not in the usual way. What you do is go into the front end of your Shopify site, just like your comment posters, and post your own comment. It will appear in the comment log just like all others and though not ideal by any means, at least you can comment. And YES, please Shopify do something with this before you lose customers. 

You also don't get notifications that folks have posted.  **sigh!** We'll hope they wake up. Thanks for posting more on this site.

[dhuratadavies]

@davidbayard Thank you, yes, I kinda figured that, it just looks very amateur to others reading the blog, who may not be aware that this is a shopify problem.  And, yes, there's also no notifications when getting a comment!!! So, I doubt the customers get a notification of me answering their questions on a comment. It shouldn't be a big thing to improve for shopify unless there's a deal between them and the app developers. Is there? I otherwise love using the platform and have recommended it loads, it's just the lack of a couple of really simple features that truly baffles me! I don't get it!!! 

[thecreativecove]

I completely agree! Unless I constantly check my blog, I miss comments which is not good!
Also, when I cannot reply directly to my customer's comments, it is very impersonal. Part of my shop's platform is to provide personalized service. They are not getting it on shopify! If something doesn't change fast, I going to change platforms.

[Nitsa]

It's not going to happen. People have been asking for this very basic functionality for years. I go back to 2015! If you want to have threaded email comments you are not going to be able to do it on Shopify, unless you install something like Disqus, at $4 it's cheap enough.
However, anyone who wants to leave a comment has to have a Disqus account, big turn-off for anyone that wants to leave a quick comment.

I have a site that runs on WordPress, and another that runs on Shopify. I wouldn't even be able to count the amount of functional upgrades on my WordPress blog site since 2015; I can count them on the blog section of my Shopify site, I don't even need 10 fingers, actually I don't need any fingers because they haven't been any upgrades since 2015. Over that period Shopify has massively changed its functionality in so many aspects, the blog remains unchanged. If a blog function is important to you then you are really using the wrong web platform, a lot of people switch platforms for that very reason.

No doubt Shopify has its reasons for not wanting to improve blog functionality, but with all the people that have gone before you, asking for exactly this thing, I doubt you're going to see it any time soon. I wish you luck.

[pjmmpls]

@Nitsa well, that is discouraging news. Perhaps they will change their mind.

[davidbayard]

Hi, Nitsa, I never did call Shopify because I didn't have the heart to deal with it...suspected what you're saying is true. So, I have a perfectly good Wordpress blog that I've had for years. Someone recommended I at least get it within the same domain name as my Shopify store...so how did you...or how would you...integrate a Wordpress blog into Shopify? The ways I see are:

a] use Shopify....that sucks, as we've all been crying out about here...

b] have my existing Wordpress blog host add my Shopify domain name and host it, at $15 a month. Then sprucing up the css to make it look like my Shopify page, add the Shopify navigation links. But it still takes them outside Shopify. 

c] Well, that's it, I've investigated custom coding to get my Wordpress into the Shopify container but dang, best I could do for a hundred bucks was get TaskHusky to put a custom image above the blog page and blog post pages

. 

So, I'm thinking about just going to another e-commerce provider? What a hassle!

Just thinking out loud with all of this, but maybe some of the other questioners can benefit from my intrepid exploration. 

REALLY FRUSTRATING! I'm a poet and writer, and blogging is essential to selling books, I think.

Thanks for listening....

[TJGator]

This is something so simple.  It's not a make it break it for me, but it adds up.  I want control of my checkout.  I want my customer to have to review their order.  I don't want PayPal and Amazon Pay to screw up the sale when it is a gift to another address.  Maybe Shopify doesn't care.  Big Commerce looks like they do and can take care of these issues for me.  It's a giant pain in the butt to switch, but so are the customer service issues Shopify puts on us.  The hours we put into order mistakes is insane.  

[Alison_Emerick]

Just came to search for a solution to this issue. So annoying as no one wants to make a Disqus account and customers aren't going to bother to go back and see if another post shows up that happens to answer their question. 

Come on Shopify- get this done!

[JaneRichmond]

@KateShore thank you for starting this new thread to draw new attention to the issue. It's surprising that no moderators have commented here as it seems many consider this a major issue.

After much research into available e-commerce platforms I chose to move my website and blog to Shopify after 10 years online. It was a huge decision and undertaking. I spent nearly a year moving everything over, migrating the blog was a beast and took the majority of the time (by far!). But I was so thrilled to have everything under one roof, so to speak, it was well worth the time invested (I had previously run my shop through Squarespace and my blog through Blogger).

Now that I have finally launched and begun blogging on my new Shopify site I've realized that I cannot reply directly to comments left on the blog. This is such a basic function by today's standards that it never occurred to me to look into this functionality before moving over. What a huge disappointment. I've spent days looking at forums for answers with no leads. I don't want to pay another extra for a third party app just for the ability to reply to customers but would be willing to in the meantime while waiting for Shopify to work this out—however I can't even find a meaningful app to this end.  

This may seem like a small thing however in a time where social media and engagements on these platforms are driving sales, I would say this is a HUGE oversight on Shopify's part. 

Can a moderator please swoop in here and provide us with information on how Shopify is working towards a solution to this?  

[Nitsa]

Shopify is not working towards this. Someone I knew asked the very same of them in a chat session and it was confirmed that there were no plans to do so. And that is the same answer I was getting more than 2 years ago. I feel your pain.

[pjmmpls]

It has been months since they told me they were looking into this. I can't find a reason to believe they are intentionally avoiding this convenience? I am so annoyed it is impossible to have a conversation with my viewers on topics they want to discuss. What am I missing? Why can't they add this feature?

[JaneRichmond]

After commenting in this thread I sent an email directly to the Shopify help desk. The feedback I received was that the best way to have our voices heard regarding this concern is to submit a feature request to the help desk. The requests can only be submitted internally so it's important to relay just how important the feature is to you and why, this all gets passed along with your request. I think the more compelling, the greater the likelihood someone will eventually listen to us. My request has been submitted, all I can do now is cross my fingers and wait! 

[KateShore]

Thanks Jane! I just emailed them as well. Hopefully more people will do this also. 

[acrobotic]

+1 on sending an email. so fuxxing annoying that we have to beg for this absolutely basic feature.

[pjmmpls]

Hey Jane, I just wrote too. I had spoken to someone a year ago and got the same nonanswer.

[Nitsa]

And of course, it’s also been running on this thread https://community.shopify.com/c/Shopify-Discussion/How-do-I-respond-to-comments-on-blog-posts/td-p/5... 

as well as quite a few others over the years. And if you start to look on places such as Reddit you will get an idea of just how long this has been going on. I think maybe what you can draw from that is that Shopify are aware of this but have their own reasons for not wanting it to happen. I don’t think it can be as simple as the old school thinking that blogs and e-commerce are separate platforms that don’t belong together. One point I will mention is that if this was to happen then the Shopify spam filters would have to improve massively because they are abysmal at present.

 After all this time I doubt that it’s going to happen, certainly if a blog with this function on it is essential to you then I think you’re on the wrong platform. Shopify is a fairly rock solid easy-to-use e-commerce platform with world domination plans and certainly those plans don’t appear to have threaded blog comments within them.

[pjmmpls]

@Nitsa Yes, I am in agreement with you now. I was holding out a bit of hope it would happen, but everything you said makes sense. In fact, when I sent my latest request to the help desk I asked them why it was they were choosing to not provide us with this service?  The ever so polite response was void of the answer and gave me the usual response, I will pass it along... and you can purchase an app. 

[Nitsa]

@pjmmpls Oddly enough, I have just been exchanging emails with an app developer who has an extensive knowledge of Shopify and he stopped working on an app because to function in a worthwhile manner it required the ability to reply to comments (without using the workaround) on the Shopify platform. They were more open with him and said that it wasn’t going to be happening.

[JasmineOPDesign]

That's brutal that they're not going to be doing anything about this. I've literally just posted my first blog and am shocked at how unsure friendly it is. I could barely edit my blog without it glitching. and the not being able to comment or get notified when there's been a response or comment? awful. 

I hope they do something. But seems like they won't be sadly.

[Nitsa]

I know this is hard to believe, but there is an upside to this. If you ever have a blog that gains any sort of traction, it will also gain spam. Shopify's spam filters are minimal to say the least, was I able to filter out comment posts that mention medications that boost your sexual performance or porn? As if!

(Ironically I cant mention the V word here on this forum or the post won't upload) but every spammer in the world can do so to your Shopify blog.

All I could do was elect not to publish immediately and  go through the posts 3 or 4 times a day and manually clear them. Even if you paid out for one of the so-called "spam blockers" available you would find you are paying for something that is as useful as a chocolate teapot. The upside? Well, if you've read through this thread you will have learnt that Shopify and blogs are like Donald Trump and election counts, they are just not a very good fit.

[PacMoldBW]

Just did a follow up with Shopify to get a resolve. Nope. Blob post comment replies are not going to happen. I sincerely hope there is a workaround that does not involve a third party app. No one will tolerate having to open an account to communicate via a blog post to ask for some sort of additional info or help. 

[Irena]

Did someone found how to respond to those comments on the blog posts? So many people are asking for this simple feature, however Shopify doesn't care at all 😞

[McSpin]

Shopify purposes cripples many features. They make money off app developers and I'm sure they want us paying more for everything if possible. They make no money by giving us a good product with the base price. They make tons of money by taking a percentage of what we pay for the apps. If you're not careful, you can drown your business with app costs on this platform. 

Our only hope is that a really good competitor gives all that shopify does, and more at a lower price. That is the only thing that will force their hand. In the meantime, learn how to integrate a wordpress blog into shopify. 

[poppiwinkle]

Thanks for trying to get this feature. I am here also asking for the ability to respond to comments on my blog. 🙄

[nitsa1]

Not going to happen. It's got worse, now the right side bar has been removed on the home page you don't even get notified you have blog comments to reply to.

[MC-Partyapps]

Hi @KateShore 

Are you still looking for a solution for blog comment replies? I'm the founder of Turboblog, a blogging app for Shopify that has built-in social media style comment threads. You can take a look at a sample post with some comments on it to get an idea of how it looks/works. 

In regard to the issues you mentioned, Turboblog offers the ability to both receive email notifications when someone comments on your blog post as well as the ability to respond directly as a author through the Shopify admin. 

I think Turboblog could really help here and I'd be happy to help you get setup for our free 10 day trial to see if would work for you. 

[AdrianTa]

It's ridiculous. Making me consider changing plattform. 

[Avivziva]

Still a very crucial feature, hope it gets implemented sometime...

[poppiwinkle]

Yikes ! That reminds me, I haven't checked my blog comments. Last time I did, there were LOTS I hadn't responded to.  My only consolation is that it hardly matters because they get no notification when I rely anyway.

🙄

[Big-Dawg]

2024 and still no reply blog comments....... Shopify does not seem to be interested in customer concerns.

[nitsa1]

I've been commenting on this thread for a while. I recently came across an app in the app store that works fine for me, notifys me of comments and lets me reply. It's a no frills app & costs $2.99 a month and it's called Sunny Comments Manager. I guess this post will bring forth the why do we have to pay brigade etc, whatever. 

[poppiwinkle]

Thanks for the tip!

[Kerri_Bennett]

Thanks.

Really can't believe this simple thing is still an issue on Shopify.

[patrickb]

Hi all. I've been hearing these complaints from my recipe app customers for years, and it's baffling that Shopify still doesn't support such a basic feature - they have been severely ignoring the blog feature of Shopify for years now (decades?).

I got fed up and built my own Shopify app called Better Blog Comments - which, as the name implies, is simply a much better alternative to Shopify's native blog comment feature.

 Here’s what it does:

• sends email notifications for new comments on your Shopify blog posts.
• allows admin replies on comments, including quick replies directly from the email notification.
• provides much better spam protection, so no more bot comments.
• an easy-to-use admin interface for managing all your comments in one place, rather than having to look at individual articles.
• includes a 5-star rating system for your recipes, guides, or tutorials, so your readers can leave reviews.
• plus, a few other handy features to make your life easier with plenty on their way
  

All in all, I just built everything missing from the Shopify blog comment system - things that platforms like Wordpress have had for ages, plus a few bonus things that are on the way 🙂

It will even import your existing blog comments from the Shopify native comment feature, so it should be a pretty smooth transition if you choose to try it out!

I literally *just* released it, so I'd love for anyone to give it a try and shoot me an email (help@betterblogcomments.com) if you have any questions or feature requests. I'm really hoping to make it as useful as possible, so any requests or things you need I'll work into the app as soon as I can.

Here is the app listing URL: https://apps.shopify.com/blogcomments
and the marketing website: https://betterblogcomments.com

Let me know your thoughts!

[Steve_the_Barte]

Looks great Patrick! Would love to try it but can't warrant paying for a basic feature considering we might get 1 comment per month, if that. It would be great if you had a free plan that was restricted to X number of comments per month... then people can test it out and upgrade when engagement grows.

[patrickb]

I can for sure add something like that! Could you send me a note at help@betterblogcomments.com so that I have it in my system and can work on this/next week?

[Steve_the_Barte]

Mind boggling that this isn't a standard feature.. it's so basic.

[bvalentine]

YES! This is the main reason I am considering moving to another platform.

[nitsa1]

Old thread. Quite a few apps out there now that do it. Cheapest $2.99. Yeah maybe it should be included but it's not bank balance breaking.