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To Moderate or not to Moderate?

johno69

Top Contributor
I've started doing some social media work and posting of videos and the like and I've had my first response that I'm not sure how to take.
So that made me think about moderation and when and when not to respond, or even delete someone else's comments.
I've generally been one for letting people have their say, they are the ones who's name sits beside the comment, not mine.
What are others thoughts on moderating?
If anyone was interested in seeing the videos I mean you can check them out here: https://www.facebook.com/lawnbowlscom
 

Shane

Top Contributor
I have a couple of large-sih pages (one approaching 30,000 likes) and from memory I'd say I've deleted maybe two comments in total. I'm happy to let language slide, and it's only been a threat of violence (a very empty threat it must be said) that I've felt the need to delete.

Personally I think it's better not to moderate, but I guess it depends a lot on the type of page and your audience. My largest page is tradie related, so there's some pretty full-on language, but I doubt anyone on there is offended. If the same language was used on a page targeted at families, then I guess you'd have no choice but to moderate.
 

atom

Administrator
It's worth creating community rules or guidelines and try and stick to them as best you can. There are always borderline cases where it's tricky, but if you have rules it can help you and whoever else is helping.
 
Agreed. I was thinking more along the lines of comments that may offend.
I personally don't mind people posting opposing views, even if other people disagree, healthy debate is good. But if you are talking about people making comments like 'all people who wear green hats and chew gum are d*ckheads', then I would moderate that type of comment because it is not in the spirit of genuine discussion and debate. People want to be able to engage in a discussion without being victimised or abused. Just my 5 cents..
 

findtim

Top Contributor
i have a client that has there own facebook person ( FP), someone posted a complaint and the FP deidn't reply so they posted again askingg if anyone is going to reply, the dickhead FP just then went and deleted her post which sent the whole thing into turmole as no explanation was offered for deletion and the orginal post was worth investigating IMO.

as above, set rules, but if you delete then explain your reasons, not to different then DNT has had to do in the past with the odd member.

tim
 

AlexRav

Regular Member
I personally would not moderate, only in the rare circumstance where a comment is hateful and not in any way productive to anyone (blatant abuse). I feel you start to walk a slippery slope when you start deleting comments that "may" offend someone, especially in this shockingly "PC" world we're moving towards, everyone gets offended or upset by the slightest of things.. don't give in to such nonsense.

I'm all for free speech and letting people say what they want, because a good community will end up moderating itself by out casting toxic people.

Just my 2c
 

Christopher

Top Contributor
Hey guys, been a while since I been on here, but this caught my attention.

I spend A lot of time on fb. In many groups. The ones that really annoy me with moderation rules, are ones where you were just trying to help the community and posted a really long post, lots of people commented and then it goes and gets deleted. Because its about potential competitor. In this case i'm talking about webinarjam, but there have been others. The whole group starts to realise the policing. And frankly the group gets abandoned by what would have been raving fans.

If you run a fan page, business page, just learn to identify when there are helpful comments that will grow your community vs spam or troll comments. It takes around 9 good turns by you to get that customer back again.

The only things I block are keywords that need to be moderated. I block around 723 words. Here is a great article with csv list to import into your pages to block. http://www.frontgatemedia.com/a-lis...ist-and-how-to-use-facebooks-moderation-tool/ (Although you may want to drop some of the keywords depending on your audience like Shane mentions above.)
 

AlexRav

Regular Member
The only things I block are keywords that need to be moderated. I block around 723 words. Here is a great article with csv list to import into your pages to block. http://www.frontgatemedia.com/a-lis...ist-and-how-to-use-facebooks-moderation-tool/ (Although you may want to drop some of the keywords depending on your audience like Shane mentions above.)

That list is really poorly created and contains a lot of words that I feel disgusted to see someone block... "hemp, prude, lesbians, ugly, thug, sniper, pot, peyote, naked, lmao, hump, hell, goddamn, godamnit, gay, fat, fart, drunk, damn, crack, beer, bang" just naming a few after a real quick scroll through. This will definitely turn people away from commenting or contributing to your community.

By using that list you are basically not allowing free speech... censorship is not the answer.
 

Christopher

Top Contributor
I differ from your view, How will the people in your audience know, It is a filter set, which moderates the responses for you, for review. If you merely like to have those words displayed on your community, Then don't include them in your filter. This is a starting point as many of us just can't think of offensive (to some) words to use to flag for manual review.

As a small business operator, I can't employ a team to sit there and watch the community, and moderate on the fly. My budgets aren't that big. I have to rely on a combination of automation and manual responses.

Again it depends entirely on your audience. Their language and what you or your business deems appropriate.

To me I have communities that are Christian based. And yes the list is there not as censorship, but as a protection. We get christian haters, and unbelievers coming into the community all the time, thinking that can troll my audience. Well the filters protect against that. And flag for review. Do you think a list like this could protect a school page, or a kids community page. I think so.

Having the right tone and language to respond to your audience is key. Here is a great response only highlighting this, this week from Woolies, over a customer complaint. http://www.9news.com.au/national/2016/01/14/08/58/woolworths-turn-mouldy-hommus-into-marketing-gold
 

chris

Top Contributor
Horses for courses, every community will have different audiences and goals.

If anyone is interested in the topic I'd highly recommend Swarm Conference, it's a conference just for community management. It's run by Venessa Paech (Comms and PR at Envato) and Alison Michalk (CEO at Quiip) who really know their stuff, it covers all these sorts of issues and more. It's a quality event with great speakers and is highly recommended:

http://swarmconference.com.au/
 

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