A Flood of Emails

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Hi everyone! I decided to write this (temporary) post about the barrage of emails re: comments that I think some of you have been experiencing recently. I was mostly offline these past days so I wasn’t aware of it until someone called my attention to it after she commented on my post today.

WordPress made changes in our comment forms so that the ‘Notify me of follow-up comments via email’ option is now checked by default. If you forget to uncheck it, you receive a lot of emails about subsequent comments on that post.  

So for the sake of your sanity (and mine because I want crazy, silly readers, not insane ones, haha), I made a little tweak that removed the Notify me of follow-up comments via email option in my blog’s comment form so you no longer need to remember to un-check it.

If you want to do the same for your blog’s readers (including me!), here’s how to do it:

  1. Go to your Dashboard, then Settings, then Discussion.
  2. Scroll down until you see the two large ‘boxes’.
  3. Below that there are three options. One is to ”Show a follow comments option in the comments form’‘. It is checked by default. Uncheck it.
  4. Scroll on down and click Save Changes.
  5. Wait for the page to re-load then check if the change you made was indeed saved. If not (it wasn’t for me at first try), rinse and repeat.

What this will do is get rid of the Notify me of follow-up comments via email’ checkbox. The option to be notified via email when a new post is made (in other words, to follow your blog) remains.

Of course, as blog admin, you will still receive emails when readers leave a comment on your own blog. But your readers will be spared the subsequent tsunami of emails that might discourage them from making any new comments. If they are fellow WordPress bloggers, they will still receive a notification (in the black navigation bar on top) when you reply to them directly.

Of course this might pose a problem to your non-WP blogging readers. But if you want to let them know that you’ve replied to them, you can email them at the same time that you post your reply. WP has that cool feature, too.

Meanwhile, let’s remember to remember to uncheck the option in other blogs’ comment forms that still have it. [UPDATE: I posted some additional info in the comments on how to stop the barrage of emails in your own inbox.] 

I hope this helps. :)

(Note: Once WordPress reverts to the old comment system, this temporary post will self-destruct in 10 seconds.) ;)

[UPDATE 2: WordPress has provided us with a new way to prevent the email flood. Finally. :) ]

105 thoughts on “A Flood of Emails”

  2. EXTRA! Here’s how to stop the barrage when you’re on the receiving end of it:

    1. Log in to WP.com.
    2. Open a new tab or stay on that tab but open this link: https://subscribe.wordpress.com/
    3. You will be directed to a page where all the blog sites and comments you subscribed to are listed. Under the logo and the ‘heading’ WordPress.com, there’s ‘Sites’, ‘Comments’, and ‘Settings’.
    4. Very important: Default view is on ‘Sites’ but you don’t want to unsubscribe from those so click on ‘Comments’.
    5. Check all that you want to unsubscribe from.
    6. Click on the downward arrow beside ‘Bulk Actions‘ on top, choose Unfollow, then Apply.

    Now breathe. :)

    Reply ↓

    • Tita Buds….you are my HERO. I was visiting Rumpy Dog today and came here from a link he posted about this. We are not WP bloggers but have been hit my a tsunami of emails in the past few days! Thank you, Thank you, Thank you!

      And a BONUS for us….You blog is absolutely beautiful! We’ll be adding this one to our reading list! : )

      xo Katie (the cat)
      & Glogirly (the girl)

      Reply ↓

      • You’re welcome, Tom. I know, they’ve been making big changes lately. The worst for me though (because there’s no workaround it) is including the Topics page in the Reader. :(

        Reply ↓

  3. Tita you said it, explained it and acknowledged the pain and frustration in such clear words. So much better than I could have done. Thank you! :D Instructions for each of the three options are clear. I did have to refresh to make my changes stay put! Excellent.

    Reply ↓

    • Thanks! I just posted a new comment/update on what to do if you’re on the receiving end of the barrage. You may share it with your readers if you want. :)

      Reply ↓

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  6. You really are an angel! Mine is terminated too. Praying the pest control is blogworldwide!
    To stop notifications into your inbox, you can also click on the ‘unsubscribe’ link at the bottom of those pesky emails and it will lead you to the subscribe page.

    Reply ↓

  7. Hi! I’m sorry I didn’t get back to you this morning. I’d already headed out.

    THANKS SO MUCH for the info on how to change my settings…. done!

    Reply ↓

    • That’s great! With all the comments on your posts, that’s surely a relief for your readers.
      Oh, I got the “testing” help I needed so it’s ok. :)

      Reply ↓

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  11. Bless you Tita Buds (and Rumpy Dog for directing me here). Yes, it was extremely overwhelming when I was inundated with e-mails from folks responding to blogs I’d been on. I follow about 40 blogs, so it was a bit much and am relieved to have a solution to cut down on unwanted e-mails. Thank you.

    Reply ↓

    • You’re welcome. I imagine it must have been overwhelming over the weekend for everyone. I did not want to add to the deluge or suffer it myself. :)

      Reply ↓

  15. Great information! I didn’t realize this box was automatically checked until I started getting literally hundreds of emails from the Weekly Photo Challenge!! What a pain!! Thanks for sharing!

    Reply ↓

    • Thanks! I was offline for a few days and I wasn’t really commenting anywhere but I can imagine the deluge had I posted something on one of those popular blogs, too.

      Reply ↓

  19. Reblogged this on Anotherdayinparadise2's Blog and commented:
    If you’re experiencing an unmanageable influx of comment e-mails, as I was, do go to tita bud’s blog, and do your bit to prevent all your blog friends from having the same problem. The remedy is really simple. She gives step by step instructions on how to stop this annoyance.

    Reply ↓

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  26. Reblogged this on The Urge To Wander and commented:
    A small request to all my dear readers to kindly remove the ‘notify me of follow up comments’ box below their comment forms. Please read Tita Bud’s post for instructions on how to do it. You would save your readers/followers a lot of ‘inbox’ pain :-)

    Reply ↓

  27. Reblogging on my site as well Tita, to try and control the damage somewhat :-)
    “A small request to all my dear readers to kindly remove the ‘notify me of follow up comments’ box below their comment forms. Please read Tita Bud’s post for instructions on how to do it. You would save your readers/followers a lot of ‘inbox’ pain :-) ”

    Reply ↓

    • Oh, there’s different approaches to it. But normally, you can post your reply via the email notification you get when a comment comes in and at the same time send a copy of your reply to the commenter. That doesn’t always work though especially when you moderate comments. I remember there’s a thread on this in the WordPress forums.

      Reply ↓

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    • You’re welcome. :)
      Out of curiosity, I looked at the tickbox in a new Freshly-Pressed post and it is checked! Some who commented must be dealing with an email flood right now. Makes me wonder if I should email the FPed bloggers. What do you think? :)

      Reply ↓

  40. Doing that is fine, i had it turned of, but as happened to me, what if a person comments and the comment needs an answer, do you turn it on again as i did.

    I don’t think that is the answer.

    I put a statement just above comments to warn people to un-tick the follow button.

    Reply ↓

    • Do you mean if you will get notified when someone comments so you can reply to them? Yes, you as blog admin will still get an email notification everytime someone comments on your blog. Your other readers won’t.
      Now when you reply directly to the comment (using the reply button under that comment and not in a separate box), your reader will be notified via the navigation bar on top.
      If he’s not on wordpress, that’s when you can email your reply to him.
      I’ve seen other blogs with a reminder similar to what you said and I think that’s fine, too.
      Whatever works, really.

      Reply ↓

  42. thank you thank you so much for this!! I just did a similar post. WordPress pulling a Facebook stunt on us? i thought they were above that. :(

    Reply ↓

  47. Thank you! I also found this re-blogged on Sonels Blog. I have just reblogged you too. This is so helpful. Do you know how to fix the page view count? My is off. It doesn’t match the number of likes or comments I’ve been getting per post.

    Thanks again for your help and have a great weekend.

    Reply ↓

    • Hi, thanks for helping inform others about this. :)

      I’m not sure if your page view count is really off. I’ve been reading the forums and there are similar questions about this. Weird as it may sound, there are ways that ‘readers’ can ‘Like’ your post even when they have not really read it or did not click to view it (thus the discrepancy in page view count).

      One would be through the WordPress Reader where the ‘Like’ button is available. As one scrolls through other posts, one can just click and click and click ‘Like’ even when all they see are just post summaries (yes, some do that). This is especially true now that the Topics page is now included in the Reader.

      Most of us also now have the Like buttons in our frontpage and a reader no longer has to click the ‘Read more…’ tab (if it’s a long-ish post) to go to the individual post’s page to be able to click ‘Like’.

      Kind of sad, when you think of it, huh.

      Reply ↓

  49. Reblogged this on Mike Hardisty Photography and commented:
    Hi everyone. I will be implementing this change soonest. I don’t know about you but I was getting seriously annoyed with all the follow-up emails that were flooding my inbox. My thanks to Tita for writing the original blog post

    Reply ↓

  50. Pingback: A New Way to Prevent The Email Flood | tita buds' blog

  51. Thank you! I thought I was going to be buried alive then for a few days after commenting on a friend’s very popular blog and getting reams of emails for every single reply on that thread! Love your writing, fab sense of humour :D

    Reply ↓

Talk to me. Please. :D

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