About a year ago if I mentioned the concept of harnessing the power of Facebook and Twitter, Tumblr, Flickr, ect as a realistic strategy for marketing a brand, I would generally get a very long "hmmmmmm ....." followed by a very pregnant pause from many of the people I talked to. A massive question mark would float over their heads as, more often than not, they just couldn't grasp the concept.
Magically within the past six months however all that's changed with virtually every person I've ever known jumping on (at least) the Facebook bandwagon. Unfortunately, rather than adopting the evolving norms of social media into the platform, which BTW are based on (1) actual human contact (2) original and interesting ideas (3) reciprocation ~ most Facebook newbies have attached dusty old marketing ideas to their shiny "new media" programs.
As a result Facebook in particular is being used in some very annoying ways. I thought I'd start tracking the most insidious behaviors and note them down here (mostly as a venue for venting my angst about the situation)....if you want to annoy on Facebook, here are some ideas:
1) Businesses who want to really tick off their Facebook fans should be sure to send incessant group emails announcing minor sales, bland product announcements, and other information that is of interest only to their internal sales staff. As a blogger, I'm used to getting press releases from other PR firms emailed rapid fire via specific email accounts, as such I really have little patience for this type of information sent to my Facebook in-box ~ and I'll lay you odds that I'm not in the minority here. Even the most casual Facebook user is most likely not interested in being spammed about your 5% off sale once a day - if they are they'll visit your page to see it. Facebook by definition is a "FACEBOOK" ie: people attached to faces, and personalized messages should only be sent this way.
2) Keep requesting your friends "fan", join a group, or attend an event 0ver and over and over - even though they've probably repeatedly chosen to ignore your previous attempts for a reason. Once is more than enough.
3) Repeatedly poke, send game requests, gift requests, and all manner of the embeddable widget nature to people you've never had any sort of correspondence with and to whom you're a complete stranger - they love that.
4) Post only the dullest and most narrowly defined product photos and information about your company on your Facebook page so that instead of a lively interactive forum with an array of accessible ideas and information, it resembles a yellow page ad.
5) Never correspond with your fans or friends when they post info of their own (you know - the stuff that comes through on your homepage news-feed from them) ~ we know you're the only one that matters! And when they comment on your posts or go so far as to post items to your page or wall, be sure to ignore them. People love being treated solely as "consumers" and not individuals - isn't that what "social" means? Oh it doesn't?? It means engaging and talking?? Whoa ....
Oh....there will be more .... stay tuned. Yes, the Medium is the Message, but only if you know how to use it. Otherwise it's just another cyber-armload of junk-mail to toss in the trash unopened.
