I have a Facebook page, and this week I was a bit unprepared for the amount of interest it got given I just generally pick up the odd person who’s interested in what I do, which is kind of how I liked it to be.
I suddenly seem to have a number of new likers, quite a few of whom have craft pages of their own and announce themselves as “a new like from xyz crafts”.
I’m stuck as to what to do now. On the one hand I have always valued integrity, I’m really not into this whole " I like you so you’ll like me thing", I really only like and favourite things I genuinely do like. And I also don’t get a lot of free time to look at everything all the time either.
But on the other hand I also feel unspeakably rude not to reciprocate, which has been causing me some stress the past couple of days.
I’d be really interested how other people deal with it and what the etiquette is in these situations.
I know exactly what you mean Emma, I used to feel the same. I felt obliged to visit all the pages and like them back, then realised that was ridiculous and stopped doing it. Now I just say a polite ‘thank you’ in reply to their message and only ‘like’ back if I genuinely want to follow their page. I don’t have thousands of likes - and probably lose a few by not returning them - but the ones I have and keep are genuine likers and tend to comment and like posts more. Don’t feel obliged to like pages just because they like yours - your tastes and interests are your own, not necessarily the same as theirs.
I know exactly how you feel! Those sort of posts make me seriously uncomfortable. I generally take a quick look at the page and like if I genuinely do like, and don’t if I don’t. And if I find the number of these type of posts are getting to me I turn off the ability of other people to post on my page for a while. Which means that only people who genuinely want to like my page without announcing themselves will do so.
In fact I watched an interesting video the other day which explained how having a large number of ‘likers’ who aren’t interested in what you do actively reduces the number of people who see what you post on your page.
These people only like your page because they want you to like them back. They will not participate on your page or are remotely interested in what you have to say. You are not interested in what they have to say, you only want to reciprocate their like. If you won’t they will unlike your page. Get ready for that action.
Are you interested in lots of fake likes? Do you want to be fake?
People chase likes, and the next thing they ask: “I have 1000 likes but I only reach 1% of those people, and no one comments/likes my statuses. What am I doing wrong?”
I’ve already had a couple unlike it, which left me thinking did I do/not do something that offended anyone, so I haven’t posted at all this week. I was a bit taken aback to be honest because I don’t announce or promote myself when I like a page, so it’s a completely foreign thing for me.
I don’t respond to these ‘likes’ either, unless I genuinely like the page. I don’t do swapping likes - it doesn’t have any benefit except to make your page look more popular because of the number of likes, but if you look at the posts on a lot of these so called popular pages, they will often only have a few people who actively follow the page.I’d rather have lesser likes with more genuine followers who interact with my page
I do always nose at who has popped over from another page though, and have liked a select few back that have genuinely interested me
yes, I agree - if someone has commented in a genuine way I’ll usually wander over. But not people who just post “a like from blogs.com” or another favourite that I’ve seen posted on my page several times, a question along the lines of “have you considered knitting your meerkats in costumes?” which shows instantly how little interest they’ve really taken!
Best one I had recently was someone liking a ton of my pics (the most recent ones), popping a message ‘love your page, new like from xxx, pop over to my page’. Already I’m a bit annoyed at being asked to pop over to the page. But, out of courtesy, I go over. It’s not really my thing, so I reply to the post on my page with a ‘thanks’, but do nothing else. I then get a reply to that, ‘please come and like my page’. Guess what? I didn’t
I don’t usually do much on Facebook as I don’t really understand it and it doesn’t come naturally, but a couple of weeks ago I was encouraged by a thread on here to try a bit harder, and I did “like” a few pages. I did send a message saying I’d done it in the hope of it being reciprocated but I do genuinely like the pages I favourited, though, so I hope no-one thinks I was being cynical!..
I don’t think you were being cynical, and I genuinely love your work and I’m grateful for you sharing mine
These are people I’ve not come across before, as a bee pendant I’d engraved went viral on facebook, and all of a sudden I get a whole shed load of craft pages “liking” me. Except they don’t do it by just clicking the button, they have to announce to the world they’ve done it on my page, and link back to themselves.
I’m very grateful to anyone who takes a genuine interest in what I do, but I think them tagging themselves appears to be more about publicity for them everywhere and it made me feel so very uncomfortable not knowing quite how to behave. People then un-liking me again left me completely mortified because I truly hate to feel I’ve upset anyone.
I have now taken the advice above and stopped people from being able to post linking to themselves on my wall which will alleviate some stress for me. I am really not good at the new kind of social networking and self promotion. My husband often jokes I’m like someone from 1910 who’s suddenly woken up in the modern world!
Hmm… You got me all thinking…
Some time ago, when I started my page, and I invited all my friends and had this idea that they will like my page then invite all their friends and so on and all these people will see my posts. But it didn’t happen.
Then I had a fantastic advice from Lisa from For the Love of Yarn, and I started to interact with other craft pages. And yes, it involves leaving messages on their pages ( I never write ‘please visit my page’, but I sign as Stitching a rainbow, so they can connect my name with my business, also only personal likes counts).
I do not do it automatically, I always have a look at the page and try to find something nice to comment on. It is not that hard even if I would never buy it I can still appreciate the work, thought and talent that went into it.
Now, when I do that, my personal friends will see that I liked that page. I sometimes invite my friend to like the page if I know there is something they will like. And even if I am not interested in buying this crafter’s work maybe my friend will.
Some pages I do follow, I like and comment regularly, other dissapear from my news feed and this is like ‘natural selection’ on fb. It doesn’t mean I have to push my friends into my competition arms, but if I make quilts I can still recomend papercrafters, jewerly makers and more.
There are crafters and artists on fb that have so many followers they don’t have to worry about their like number, and they usually share more of other peoples work than theirs. And this is fantastic, it can bring a whole stream of people that already are buyers and love handmade stuff and appreciate it. But for this you have to be active, visit pages and leave your ‘card’ there. And people come to you and leave their ‘cards’.
It is time consuming, I know that, I have a system and a time set of every week to "return calls’. I can tell it is working for me.
xx
Magdalena
I will see if I can find it… I think @NiftyKnits posted it in the thread we inhabit over on Etsy so she might be able to find it more easily… we do chatter a lot there so there will be a lot of pages to scroll back through
I tend to accept people and then after a week or two unfriend most of them (they rarely notice!) Maybe naughty but it gives you a chance to see who the genuine people are.
I can see your points, perhaps I’m not your average Facebook user then. I keep my personal friend list very small, I use it to keep in touch with people who don’t live near me. I dislike my newsfeed being very big because I miss important things from my friends, so I don’t like pages who post umpteen times a day and spam it up. If I " liked" a jewellery page, I expect to see their work, not something else entirely, because I don’t have time to look at it all. Perhaps I’m not normal!
I do not like my personal newsfeed to be big as well, and I rarely visit pages as Magdalena, and because I do not engage, they do not show. But I also like as Stitching a rainbow, and there in my business newsfeed I engage. So I like the page twice: one time it’s personal and add to the count and second is business and it keeps my crafty love at one place.
Hope that makes sense.
Love the video, it is great warning about buying likes, which personally to me seemed strange when fb suggested it. I rather go and engage and get genuine clicks than be clicked together with mouthwash
even if I would never buy it I can still appreciate the work, thought and talent that went into it.