The Social Media Invite That Cried Wolf
The Social Media Invite That Cried Wolf
Why inviting your whole friend group to follow your business is a waste of time.
I’m going to say this at the risk of a lot of my Facebook friends giving me the stink eye, but we need to talk about this.
One of my least favorite things to see in my inbox is an invite to like or follow someone’s business fan page out of the blue. My second least favorite thing is when they do this every few months for a new business page.
When a Facebook friend or a connect on any platform perpetually does this, I’m not quick to engage. Very likely, I, unfortunately, won’t take the invite seriously and I don’t take action for two reasons:
I don’t know what your business is about because you didn’t tell me.
Just because I’m your friend, it doesn’t mean that I’m your customer.
This piece is about the pre-launch phase of your business when you can’t wait to tell everyone in your life about your new business.
Being excited about opening your business’ doors is great (and so encouraged!), but you need to put your business hat on as soon as those doors open. You need to pursue audience-building in a strategic way, which probably won’t include hitting up your friends and family.
Consent First, Please.
Don’t get me wrong, there will likely be some people in your friend and family group who are genuinely interested in buying your product. However, to do that, you should have a conversation with them first.
I think that a lot of us have forgotten our manners when it comes to conducting ourselves within an online space. If it’s rude to send numerous unsolicited postcards to our friends and family about our business, why wouldn’t you consider it rude to do that online?
You introduce your business off on the wrong foot when you kick things off this way. You set yourself up for people to ignore you when they’re on the receiving end of a mass-invite blast.
No one likes spam and just because you’re a friend, it doesn’t mean that what you’re doing isn’t spam.
Here’s what I recommend what you do instead.
Rather than bombarding your family and friends about your new business (which they didn’t even agree to), you should reach out to them individually or tell them in person about what you’re building.
If they genuinely have an interest or they know people that would be interested, only once you’ve received that consent should you invite them to follow you on Instagram or engage with your business another way.
It’s also extremely lazy to pitch a business that you care about to the people you care about with the gesture of just read the bio section of the business page I invited you to, you’ll figure it out. If you don’t put care into how you introduce your business, your friends and family won’t care to engage.
If you’re not sure who will be interested in what you’re building, a great way to fish for interest is to put out a post introducing the business and inviting your friends and family to join you on your social pages if it’s something they’re interested in.
Building a business relationship with your friends and family after they’ve accepted an invitation is much more likely to produce meaningful engagement.
Friends Don’t Always = Customers
Some of you may have the motive of inviting your friends and family to engage with you on your social pages because you want to beef up your follow numbers.
Do you know what’s worse than having a small follow number? An audience that doesn’t react, engage or buy when you try to sell your products on your social pages.
Follow numbers are purely for vanity and they really don’t mean much of anything if you’re a business trying to make money. Engagement far trumps follows, so get your hands dirty and do the work to build an audience that’s composed of actual potential customers.
Also, why are you trying to get the attention of those who will never buy from you? Isn’t your time better spent looking for those who are already on the market, shopping for what you’re selling?
The main point of building an audience online isn’t to show that people care about your brand because you have a lot of follows. The point of building an engaged audience on social is to bring in some sales. Your social platforms should be a sales tool, not a popularity contest.
Rather than flirting with friends and family who already love you, do the hard work and pursue the audience who doesn’t know you yet.
Put down roots with an audience who actually wants what you’re selling, because that’s truly the characteristic of a real business — you’re capable of compelling purchase from complete strangers who just have a pain point in need of solving.
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