Posted by Darlene Hull in Facebook

Author: Darlene Hull

Whaaaaat?! Why wouldn’t I want more “likes”?

I build my reputation on my Facebook page carefully, selectively, and honestly. As far as I can control it, all the likes you see there are likes from people who stopped by and honestly liked my page. This is important to me. Let me try and explain what I’m on about and set the scene:

You are throwing an open house for your business clients and prospects. You’ve set the stage, ordered great food, hired stellar entertainment, and you’ve got people milling around making sure everyone has what they need, is getting helped with their questions, and is having a great time.

Someone you don’t know shows up and brings some friends – great news! You work to make them all feel welcome and engaged. Suddenly this person shouts to the room, “Hey! There’s an open house going on at my place of business, too! Come on over and bring your friends!”. They leave and take a handful of your guests with them. You stand there, shocked at this appalling display of bad manners.

That is bad manners, right? We’re all on the same page there?

Well this week alone I’ve had that exact scenario 3 times on my HotSpot Facebook page

Inexperienced marketers stop by my page, “like” it, and then post boldly: “I liked your page please like mine!” and then post their link.

So, a couple of things are happening now.

1. Someone who’s just browsing through and lands on my page with enough focus to read through might look at that link and click away, never to come back (shiny bauble syndrome) because they weren’t able to spend quite enough time on my page to be properly engaged before being drawn away. I have worked hard to create that traffic in an honest and upright manner through carefully crafted blog posts and status updates after considerable research. I’d like those new eyes to land there long enough to find something of value in what I’ve gathered just for them.
2. If this happens often on my page and I don’t remove it, people will think that all my “likes” are contrived and have no meaning, and my authority and integrity suffer.
3. Some other marketers (not me – yet) may get tired of this and start blocking the person posting, and then the poster’s page could well get shut down.

There is no win/win here when the game is played this way:

1. The person receiving the like in order to gain reciprocation looks silly (or worse, rude) on the page their posting on.
2. The recipient feels frustrated and deletes the request, creating no gain for either party – or – they go and “like” the other page, but because it’s not interesting to them because the “like” wasn’t honestly gained, stop following the updates and so the “like” has no meaning

There is a better way. A way that builds trust and authority for both sides, and builds strong collaborative bonds between fellow business owners. I’ll share that in my next post.

In the meantime, have you had this happen before? Am I foolish in my frustration? Am I making a mountain out of a molehill?

Share your thoughts in the comments below:

Darlene