Has this ever happend to you…
You visited the Facebook or Twitter page of a business that had a moderate following on one day, yet upon visiting a few days later, their likes/followers increased exponentially with no apparent explanation.
Insincere Likes on Facebook
In the past few months Facebook cracked down on what it is calling “insincere likes.” A team from Facebook made this comment in this Space Daily post:
“We have recently increased our automated efforts to remove Likes on pages that may have been gained by means that violate our Facebook terms. These newly improved automated efforts will remove those Likes gained by malware, compromised accounts, deceived users or purchased bulk Likes.”
Because of the ‘herd mentality‘ people often feel more comfortable with a brand that has numerous likes.
Sure.
But “a Like that doesn’t come from someone truly interested in connecting with a page benefits no one,” Facebook said.
True.
It’s like inviting people you don’t know to your own birthday party just to impress people you do know. Consequently, the people you do know will realize what you’ve done, and you’ll lose their respect quite quickly.
Fake Followers on Twitter
I was approached by a video production company for a project recently. While doing my due diligence and visiting the company’s Twitter page, I was surprised to see that a relatively new business had over 25,000 Twitter followers.
There were two explanations:
1. This guy had a ton of friends who believe in him.
2. He bought followers.
Just perusing his followers list, I noticed nearly all the profiles looked like this one:
A profile that has no tweets, no picture, and no followers is a clear sign that this guy (and probably his whole business) may be disingenuous.
The Solution
Develop online relationships similarly to developing offline relationships. Connect with people and offer value to them and they will want to connect with you.
Building an online platform happens via strategic implementation of proven tools for sincere engagement.