Name just about any large company these days, and chances are you’ll be able to find them on Facebook. Or tweeting their chubby lil fingers off. Sure, this prevailing trend to add social media to your marketing plan has been building for some time. But, is it really doing any good? Or is it really doing more potential harm?
I, personally, don’t connect with too many companies/brands on Facebook. There are a few like Peet’s Coffee and Moonstone Cellars that I “friended” but don’t necessarily “follow.” (This is especially true for Peet’s since I now live in a Peets-free zone.) There are also a few bands (like the Indigo Girls or Levi Kreis) that I follow, but that’s not exactly the same kind of fan that companies are rushing to FB to find IMO.
My journey into FB hell was mostly prompted by friend requests of the local sort. Once I exposed myself to the masses, people from high school and college were finding me online. I gladly accepted any and all friend invites. It was great fun to reconnect with some of the people I’ve lost track of. That is, until I started reading/hearing about the privacy issues that are running rampant on FB.
One of the latest can be found on gizmodo.com. The “Top 10 Reasons You Should Quit Facebook” lists a bunch of things that I know I need to think more about. And also be careful about.
If I, Joe the Individual, needs to be extra leery of not only an account being hacked, but also an identity compromised, what happens to all the individuals who “friend” a company/product/brand? Can all that information be hacked, too? Could a competitor be able to hack into the friend base of another in an attempt to sabotage or steal?
I don’t know the answers to these questions. I just know for myself that I have started to ween myself off FB, and striving to kick the habit of wanting to constantly check back with all the feeds.
Guess what it all comes down to is getting back to more face-to-face interaction, and less Facebook interaction. And to recognize that it’s not always best to be up with the latest and greatest marketing tools until said tools can guarantee that privacy matters.