As the latest investigative report pointed out that
companies might be wasting their money on social media adverts, does this spell
the death knell of f-commerce?
By: Ringo Bones
Ah, f-commerce – the supposedly hipper, younger version of
e-commerce that’s born out of the recent boom of handheld and mobile devices
that can access the internet, especially leading social media sites like
Facebook. But will this upstart on-line advertising business model soon be spoiled
by fake Facebook users / profiles opting to click the like button?
As the latest investigative report in the BBC – which was
aired back in July 13, 2012 – pointed out that companies buying Facebook
adverts are merely wasting their money due to most of the users clicking the
like button are largely composed of fake or phantom users / profiles. Quite
sobering, given that companies opting to paying good money for adverts on
Facebook are probably just in it for the “like button clicks”. Sadder still, the
investigative report also pointed out that most of those “authentic” Facebook
users who opt to click the like button are simply doing it at random and
probably have no interest in the company advertising their products or services
whatsoever.
A typical Facebook advert usually gets about 3,000 likes
during the first 24 hours of posting. How much of these likes are from
authentic users – or users who genuinely like or have used and liked the
products and services being advertised are a different question entirely.
Sadly, the “powers-that-be” on Facebook are currently quite reluctant to crack
down on fake / phantom profiles and users unless they violate Facebook’s
community standards as they are paid upfront by companies advertising on the
famed social media site who are only doing so for the like button clicks. It
might be a different story if these phantom / fake users start behaving like
that notorious Nigerian Prince and start swindling Facebook out of millions of
dollars.
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