Are Businesses Today Still After Zombies?
The past month was a very interesting yet busy one. One of my companies, OpenMinds Resources underwent a complete overhaul with the establishment of a new team; launched the largest gathering of online fashion entrepreneurs (MOFEW) in Malaysia for the 2nd time and published a research paper in the recent Global Communications Conference (GCA). These events allowed me to speak to many students, business owners and academicians from all over Malaysia and when told that I help businesses position their brand online using social media platforms, the immediate question would be:
“How many fans / likes can you guarantee?”
My answer: “None.”
You can imagine the shock and horror written on their faces. But it is true – no one can guarantee the number of likes or followers on your Facebook / Twitter page and here’s two simple reasons why:
#1: Followers are human
And because they are human, anything and everything can be a reason to follow / unfollow you. It could be personal preferences, peer pressure, trend, curiosity, to win something, to lodge a complaint, to spy, to learn and yes, even by accident.
#2: Even if they could guarantee, they’re zombies
Given all these situations, how do some social media gurus out there guarantee, you ask? Simple. They are bought and this is no longer something new. Anyone can purchase hundreds or thousands of followers at a very affordable rate and most of these followers are either real, involuntary followers (bad), bots (worse) or fake accounts (worst) – and all 3 will not benefit you.
Before you click away in disbelief, here’s one of my favourite fan-purchasing experiment I’ve read on AllFacebook.com:
Fake accounts with fake pictures
On a serious note…
While you may want to have a huge fan / follower base across social media platforms, getting guaranteed fans is merely instant gratification. If you’re serious in growing your business using social media, forget about locating a social media specialist / consultant / guru / master that will guarantee you followers. You do not want a horde of zombies following you anyway. Last I checked, zombies aren’t sociable.