Performing Your Due Diligence on Social Media

In the digital age, many professionals conduct a portion of their due diligence on social media.

 +Companies research clients.

+Clients research companies.

+Employers look up employee candidates.

+Candidates read up on potential employers.

Here are a few tips to help determine which social media accounts and profiles have a genuine presence and following…and which do not.

Facebook Fakers

No company wants to have 13 straggling followers on their Facebook page, making their brand look unimpressive, limp and lifeless.

A simple fix? Buy ‘likes’!

Yes, many have chosen to simply purchase ‘likes’ to give the appearance of an actual following. In other words, they’re cheating.

The simple way to tell a cheating brand from a genuine one is to look at overall engagement and ask “is the engagement proportional to the size of the following?”

If no, there are two possible reasons: poor content that is not attractive and tailored to the brands following, or they have no actual following.

Twitter Cheaters

Much like Facebook, Twitter cheaters lack actual engagment.

I recall seeing a small ad executive’s pitch for services at a stuffy (and borning meeting). I sensed  the guy was full of hot air and checked out his company’s Twitter account. Over 25,000 followers and when I looked over the alleged followers, most of them had sent no tweets and still had the egg-head default profile picture Twitter automatically assigns.

Tip: If you’re checking out a company or individual, visit Status People, a site that analyses the percentage of genuine and fake Twitter followers on any given Twitter account.

Quick Disclaimer

Just be mindful that not all users with large followings are cheaters. From Mashable:

“People with large real Twitter followings, from celebrities to activists like Yoani Sanchez, are made to look guilty when they are in fact innocent. Fake followers created for sale to impostors like Santiago Swallow follow real users in an attempt to outwit Twitter’s generally very effective spam management systems. The more followers you have, the more likely it is that a fake follower will follow you. By trying to inflate themselves with the electronic equivalent of silicon implants, fakers make the system noisy for everyone.”

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