Holding Back Posts? Facebook?

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Have you ever created an event in Facebook? Sure, I've been invited to events hundreds of times, however, this was something new for me and I couldn't wait to finally test out that feature! Case in point:

For my other endeavor, Groovy Reflections Radio I've been creating events for the first original show rolled out, My Front Porch. It's a show about folk music that has lots of humor (and song of course!). Since there are 16,000+ fans on the Groovy Reflections Facebook page, I thought that having an "event" for the radio program would make sense since there's an instant audience with fans who would be interested in the show!

Boy, was I wrong. While a page can create an event, a page cannot directly invite people to the event! Interesting huh? It has to do with spammers taking advantage of that feature. Well, okay. So I need to "join" and then invite my friends! That feels spammy to me so I try not to invite the same people all the time. The show is broadcast three times a week, thus three events a week.

However, over the past few weeks of observing the response to the events, I noticed something interesting. Very few people actually SEE the posts made on the page about the event. Facebook is holding out on us; they want us to pay! For the most part, I've been including the URL to the event in those posts to make it easy for people to join the event which could be the trigger for Facebook to "slam on the brakes" as far as sharing the post goes. 

Here's a recent invite. The snip is from about one hour after the post. A total of 249 people saw the post (out of 16,500 fans on the page). That's not many eyeballs!

About 45 minutes later I made another post. No URL, no invite. Just copy. In a very short time frame (in this case under a half hour), the post was seen by well over 1,000 people, more than four times as many that saw the previous post!

What's up with THAT, Facebook?

For the record: This little experiment has been conducted several times, all with the same results. And what have we learned?

• DO post about your events without links as well as with them to get the word out. 

• Post about your events several times! Only a small percentage of fans will see the information about your event at any given time; they may be offline when you post and/or Facebook is sharing your post to just a few of your fans via the newsfeed. Post during different times of the day as well.

• Don't be discouraged if only a handful of people reply. We're all getting bombarded with information nowadays; and you may get tuned out. 

• Facebook should not be your only source for announcing events. Utilize other social networks such as Twitter and Google+.

Create eye catching artwork for your event and a great name for your event! In my example above I used the theme of the show rather than the actual name of the show: "Viagra, Bananas, and Knees" sounds more intriguing compared to "My Front Porch"!

Speaking of that fine fruit, Harry Belafonte sang about bananas long ago. Peel back those social media layers and create a smooth, tasty strategy! No need to go bananas! Stop by our website, or say hello on Twitter, Facebook, or Google+. 

I Was Bullied By Facebook Fans.

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Yes, I was. And I let them do it.

My Groovy Reflections page (my other biz) posts a lot of music videos in celebration of 60’s/70’s music and pop culture.

Among the things we post are birthdays. It was Gary Glitter’s birthday. If you don't know, Mr. Glitter had some major troubles including taking advantage of children (to put it mildly). He was caught (thankfully). He has paid his dues and is still doing so. While I certainly don't endorse his actions, I hope he can live up to his wrongdoing and find peace. Oh yes and he had a big hit with Rock & Roll Part 2 in 1972. My post said: 

“Happy Birthday to Gary Glitter, born in 1944. We celebrate his big hit from 1972. Hey…”

A few likes showed up and then some negative comments including a very irate fan that used very colorful language. That sam fan also sent a message. It read: “gary glitter is a convicted kiddie fiddler please remove this”

Now I admit I have a lot of fight in me. However, the comments and the message hit me at a bad time. So I wimped out and removed the post and posted an apology.

One of my Groovy Reflections team members woke me up. He messaged to me: “You cannot let them bully you.”

Alas. it was already too late. I deleted the post. Shortly afterwards I posted a question to the fans as to whether or not we should continue posting anything related to Phil Spector, since he is a convicted murderer. No one replied. Hmmm.

That GR team member took the issue a step further and made several posts in celebration of those who are “notorious”.

Here are a few examples:

• Jim Morrison exposed himself on stage once but we are posting his 1969 hit anyway.
• This 1965 smash (and many other "Wall of Sound" hits that we love so much), was produced by convicted murderer Phil Spector, but we are posting it anyway.
• Imagine that a fellow was busted in England for drug possession.....then later, that same fellow was being deported from the USA because of Nixon, the FBI and the CIA. Imagine that after five years of court battles, this criminal got to stay in the USA.....Imagine if we posted his music anyway.

Wow! We listen to music by Jim Morrison (The Doors), great tunes produced by Phil Spector, and John Lennon! And they are all bad boys! Imagine that! 

And his final post before handing “the wheel” over to the next GR team member (admin):

• This 1972 hit is played at sporting events all over the world. It was Top 10 in its day and most of us liked or loved it. Unfortunately, Gary Glitter (born Paul Francis Gadd) is not that great of a human being. However, he has paid for his crimes. We are posting his song. If you do not like it, do not listen to it. ALSO, walk out of any sporting or other event IMMEDIATELY when you hear it........as you can see from the past six posts, if we only posted stuff by angels we would be pretty limited.

Since I'm not a big sports enthusiast, I had no idea that Gary Glitter’s hit song was played at major events. I can just imagine the crowd screaming out their "hey...eh..hey...eh's" at my local sports arena.

Joe, thank you. You proved your point! To steal a phrase (and title) from a Tom Petty song “I won't back down” in the future. Not sure what happened to my "Jersey"!

So, here we go. I’m posting this song. Here. Right now. If you don't like it don't listen to it! I like the song. It reminds me of a certain period in my life. And as I stated above, I hope Paul Francis Gadd (Gary Glitter) finds peace in his life. And as one fan commented “forgive his soul but not his actions”. Well said.

This is the world of social media. Advice for you? Stick to your convictions. I promise I will stick to mine and I won't let anyone bully me in a social media situation again. 

This tune was a 1972 #2 in the UK and #7 in the U.S. (see below). And tune into great tunes at the brand new radion station, Groovy Reflections Radio! 

Marketing hat just went back on! You are most welcome to make a tuneful stop by the ModlandUSA website, or visit us on Twitter, Facebook, or Google+.    

Don’t Just “Like” My Page.

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Watch out folks, I’m going to rant a little. Some of you know that I have several pages. When I initially started those pages I didn't start plugging them relentlessly on my personal profile nor did I invite all my friends. I DID invite friends, however, ONLY the ones that I thought would be interested in the subject matter.

Pages aren’t about your friends.

They’re all about the folks who have an interest in what’s being presented to them. The point is to make it so darn interesting to them that they comment on the posts. That’s engagement; it’s key to survival for a page.  And yes, its lots of hard work, so if you’re not ready to put in the time, don’t start a page until you’re ready to commit to it.

I work my butt off coming up with original, interesting articles to please the good fans on one of my pages, MODern Marketing 4 U(ModlandUSA). Don't worry; I enjoy the writing! Very few respond and/or comment. For now; that’s okay. Facebook is not the main source of traffic for my blog readership and may never be. Despite that fact, I continue to work hard to keep my audience on Facebook captivated.

And lately I’ve had a flood of folks from Twitter say “like my page and I’ll like yours.” Truth is I’d rather see you display an actual interest in my page and talk to me than just merely “like” it! Honestly, I felt funny liking a B to B biz recently that offered office management services to landscapers, plumbers, and the like. There’s nothing I need there. Sigh.

But back to the friends. I probably get four or five requests a week to join a page and most of them are concerned with products or services that I’m not interested in. Do you please your friend and like their page or blow them off? There have been a few instances when I’ve felt comfortable enough to write to the page owner to tell them WHY I won’t like it.

Does having me there as a number and not as a participant really add any value?

Personally, I’d rather have fewer fans and a higher engagement “talking about this”. Currently, my Groovy Reflections page is at 36%, ModlandUSA is at 10% and Gizmo and His Groovy Friends is at 12%. These are great numbers since the average is 3 to 4%. Thank you fans!

In closing, I just have one request: Talk to me...on my website, Twitter, Facebook, or Google+! I love to yack. 

The Byrds sang about pages long before Facebook had them: