Stop me if you have heard this before: “my company wants to setup a Facebook page that will allow us to truly connect with (other options include, engage, reach, talk to, or create dialogue with) our audience.” This noble cause becomes the hallmark of the Facebook program. Content and plug-ins are used to actually excite and engage the audience, and everything is good in the world. Until it comes time to determine how the campaign will be measured. Immediately the focus turns to harvesting “likes” by the tens of thousands, like a Prospector harvested gold pebbles in the 1800s, with Marketers and PR professionals alike are viewing each “like” as if it were a running count on validation of a job well done. Well, I hate to be the one that bursts the bubble, but a “like” doesn’t always equate to success.
Facebook may see it differently. In fact, you can find a report on Facebook called “The Value of a Liker” that tells us that “People who click the Facebook Like button are more engaged, active and connected than the average Facebook user…that they have 2.4X the amount of friends…and that they click on 5.3X more links to external sites,” but those stats refer to Likes for a particular piece of content on news sites, not a brand.
Entrepreneur posted an article titled, “Understanding the Value of a Facebook Fan” where author Mikal Belicove presents some interesting stats from a SocialCode study conducted in 2011. The stats seem to conclude that Facebook fans (people who Like a brand) are 291% more likely to engage with brands than nonfans. This U.S. report also states that the average Cost Per Acquisition (CPA) for a nonfan is almost $10 higher than a fan. While these facts seem to point to the undeniable importance of a Like, Mr. Belicove says it best when he concludes that while all these stats are impressive, “How much more did we sell to the folks who signed on as our fans?”
Continue reading
