Not too long ago we talked about Twitter etiquette and now we have come to some thoughts on the practice of suggesting to friends to become a fan of a certain page.  Some balance really needs to be applied to how you go about building your fan base.  Lately I have been receiving repetitive requests to fan a page from the same individuals.  There seems to be almost no time span in between these requests.  I choose to ignore pages that I do not feel are something that would interest me and I wake up the next morning and the same request is there again from the same individuals and multifamily companies.  I know I am not the only one this has happened to since I see similar comments on the Facebook news feed regularly. 

In my opinion it's just bad business overall.  I personally see nothing wrong with suggesting to your friends when you have opened a new page.  I have done it myself with the four that I operate for The Training Factor.  After that though it is my responsibility to let people know about these channels by other means.  These other methods will help you grow your following in a respectable and organic way.  Here are some bullet points that I have used and would love to see some others posted in the comment section below.

1.        Advertising that I have a Facebook page on our company newsletter.

2.       Creating a Facebook badge for our website and our blog.

3.       Tagging individuals or other Fan pages in our status updates.

4.       Posting regular content so that our pages show up in search engines.

5.       Including a link to our Facebook page in our email signatures. 

6.       Occasionally posting that we have a Facebook page on Twitter. 

7.       Asking clients who feel the page has value, to suggest the page to others.

8.       Creating a temporary Facebook ad campaign that targets a specific audience.

There may be others you wish to include below.  The point of these pages is to create "fans" not to aggravate someone to the point they fan the page just to stop the suggestions from coming in.  It's the same thing that parents go through with their children sometimes, if they are having a bad day.

Child: Can I have a cookie.

Parent: No dinner is almost ready.

Child: Can I have a cookie, I am hungry now.

Parent: No.  You can wait until dinner.

Child: I can't wait ..... I want a cookie now!

Parent:  I have told you for the last time, you are not getting a cookie before dinner!!

Child:  But I am sooooo hungry!!

Parent: Argghhh Ok fine... here is your cookie.

Is that the kind of business relationship you are trying to start with me?  I certainly hope not.  Sending out daily page suggestions to all of your "friends" on Facebook is not a good business practice.  If I am wrong, please share your point of view below.  If I am correct, then go for it! Please comment.

Ellen Thompson has some great thoughts as well on her post from a few days ago! 

Written by Jonathan Saar--The Training Factor