If you’re new to prTini, the Double Shot is a semi-regular feature where I highlight two people, tools or timely articles that I recommend. The goal? A quick read with helpful, actionable takeaways.
Since Facebook announced its plans to ban “like-gating” come November (Need a quick vocab lesson? Like-gating is just a fancy way of incentivizing fans to like your page through contests, giveaways, etc.), I’ve seen an onslaught of articles about what the move means for marketers. But, only a few really caught my attention. I hope you find them helpful, too!
- Jon Loomer wrote a very interesting, in-depth summary of the ban’s impact on the value of the like: “If users are liking pages for the purpose of getting something rather than because they actually want to see the content from that brand, it can harm the user experience. A bad user experience means users spend less time on Facebook. … But preserving the value of the like is extremely important for advertisers as well. If I target users who like Brand B’s page, I do so because I think they have a common interest. But if Brand B built their audience through nothing but contests and giveaways, the value of that targeting is minimized.”
- If you’ve ever leveraged bloggers/influencers to extend the reach of a PR campaign, you’ll want to read this post from Shelly Kramer (and tweak your strategy accordingly!): “Say you want to do an influencer outreach campaign and pay bloggers to say nice things about your product and share links to your app and have them encourage their audiences to ‘like’ your page. Well, to me, that seems like it fits into the no-can-do category. They are being directly compensated to go out and drive traffic to your app, thereby ‘buying’ likes.”