If you are sick of spam comments on your WordPress website one thing you can do is to add a comment policy message to warn off potential spam. Comment spam comes in many forms and is not always automated and obvious. Nowadays there are humans commenting on sites with the intention of link building and it is not so easy to block them as it is an automated commenting software program .

I will try anything to get rid of spam comments on my website and having a comment policy message on your website is a good idea.

Just a simple message just above the comment form does wonders.

Quick Tips for Adding a Comment Policy:

  1. When editing the code of your website, make a copy of the code and paste it onto a notepad. That way if you make a mistake you can use the original code to fix your problem.
  2. One tiny error in your code, as tiny as a missing semi colon, it can render your code useless.
  3. Do not make your commenting policy too harsh because you might stop valuable discussion from forming.

Add a Comment Policy Message to Your Comment Form in WordPress

1. Login to your WordPress dashboard.

2. Click on the Appearance menu, then click on Editor. See the screenshot below.

3. When the editor opens you will see code on the page, do not touch it.

5. Go to the Template menu on the right hand side. Find comments.php and click on the link. See the screenshot below.

6. Look for the end of your comment section. Mine has

</div><!–comments–>

at the end.

7. Paste your comment policy message above that.

8. Press on update file to save the changes.

Here are the results below. My comment policy stands out.

Example Commenting Policy Messages

COMMENTING POLICY: We love comments here but we have rules. Please do not use keywords in “Name” field; you MUST leave a real name in order to get your comment approved. Spamming for a link will not be tolerated on this site so do not waste your time.

WEBSITE COMMENT POLICY:
**Please be aware that all comments made are moderated and SPAM will not be published.
**Comments must relate to the post topic. This website is here to help people, not for your advertising purposes.

Watch this video tutorial to see how I embedded this message into the php code of my WordPress website. Please note: This video shows how to insert this comment policy message into an older WordPress website.

CODE I USED

Comment Policy in force from 01 Nov 2010

**Please be aware that all comments made are moderated and SPAM will not be published.
**Comments must relate to the post topic. This website is here to help people, not for your advertising purposes.

Does This Comment Policy Message Work?

In a nutshell, yes. I have Commentluv Premium to take care of most spam but small amounts were getting through (unfortunately human spammers). This way it makes them think twice before even bothering to put a comment that will only get deleted in the long run.

Read more: