The Time of “Like-Gating” is at hand

By Niclas Hulting

Yesterday was a good day. It was a great day. It was also a day that many, many marketers will remember as a hard lesson learned. That lesson?

Never build campaigns or marketing collateral around someone else’s property. Always build on property you own.

With the Graph API v2.1 release on Nov. 5, changes to the API and (a policy change) ushered in the end of Like-Gating.

What is Like-Gating and why should you care? Well, I can tell you what Like-Gating is but not if you should care or not. You’re going to have to figure that out for yourself.

Facebook thinks that users should be liking your page based on the awesome content you’re producing, not for any other incentives.

Like-Gating is when a company forces a Facebook user (someone who hasn’t already liked your page) to like your page before she gets to access additional content.

It’s a tactic used with the goal of growing your “Like” base or number of followers.

The rationale for the change? Facebook thinks that users should be liking your page based on the awesome content you’re producing, not for any other incentives.

As marketers, we agree wholeheartedly. You don’t want followers who only follow your page because there was a 5-percent-off sale that lasted for a week. You don’t want followers who have to be incentivized in order to follow your brand. Incentivized users are not engaged users.

What you do want is to have a captivated audience that chooses to follow your brand because they like your product(s) or service(s). You want an engaged user base that follows your brand because they like, or have a vested interest in, you.

The main takeaway here is that Facebook had a policy and they changed it. Companies can certainly be mad about this change, but that’s all they can be. We don’t own Facebook (well, some of us might). Facebook is a corporation that can do pretty much whatever it feels like (assuming there is support from its board).

You don’t want followers who have to be incentivized
in order to follow your brand.

It’s unfortunate for marketers that something that was OK and even encouraged by Facebook now is no longer possible.

The lesson learned here is that you don’t ever want to put all your eggs in one basket. Especially if that basket belongs to the Big Bad Wolf dressed up as your grandma.

Niclas Hulting
Inbound Channel Manager
BMDG

Photo: FacebookBrand.com