Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Does buying thousands of Facebook Fans/Likes affect SEO?
-
To begin with, please pardon me if this question is ignorant. I'm completely new to this whole social media thing, and somewhat feel it is overhyped. I find it really difficult to believe that social media will actually help the majority of small business owners out there like me, and that most of them are probably being misled about the powers of social media to increase sales.
Because it's mentioned so frequently, I've decided to delve into it a bit more to see how this could possibly help me business.
Over the past few weeks, I've become familiar with a company that sells Facebook Likes, Twitter followers, as well as YouTube and SoundCloud plays. Since my official Twitter and FaceBook accounts really didn't have that many followers, I decided to buy a few thousand followers for each account.
Initially, I bought them because I wondered what would happen if a customer that visited my online store happened to go to those Twitter and Facebook pages. If I personally see a Facebook page with few followers, I probably wouldn't give them my business. I would want to go with a company that seems to generate a bunch of traffic to their pages.
Originally, I only had about 200 Facebook followers (now called Likes, it seems) and maybe 25 Twitter followers. I now have over 12,000 Twitter followers and 2,000 Facebook Likes. I may end up buying more since the service was pretty quick and affordable.
I'd like to know if Google factors Likes and followers into it's formula for creating SERPS. Will my website rank higher if I have 10,000 likes, rather than only 200? If so, would it be a notable increase?
FWIW, I found that more people organically started following my Facebook and Twitter accounts once I had more followers. I didn't change anything about how I maintained the page; I just had more people following them.
One other thing of note: these companies are almost certainly using fake/hacked accounts to like various pages around Facebook/Twitter. You can tell because my Facebook page says some city in Croatia has the most amount of 'likes' of my page. Do you think this might come into play at all?
Thanks for any and all help!
-
As far as I know it does NOT affect SEO. It does increase the likelyhood of someone linking to you though. "IF" you want to know if this is worth it, look at your Google Analytics and see if people are converting on your website. Measure your FB and Twitter visits and assign a value to it.
My point here is not to focus on "will Likes and Tweets increase rankings". My point is "Do those Likes and Tweets turn into conversions".
Here is a secret of mine. Social Media does land me business, but not as much as Google Adwords. Adwords KILLS social media in my clients' industries. My clients only care about more money in the bank, not about FB Likes and Tweets.
LEARN how to use GA.
-
Not sure about the SEO...I guess if others are sharing your content maybe it would help. On the other hand if I went to a site and it had 12,000 likes my first reaction would probably be "spammy". My second reaction would be I wonder how much he paid for those likes. If others can see all your fans in Croatia with a different language theymight think the same thing. I guess it depends on your service area and market.
If fake accounts are being used I am sure eventually the gig will eventually be up!
Boo
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Facebook Page - About/Description/General About/Mission - Questions
Hi, Im just setting up a FB fan page for a client How terrible is it to use clients websites home page descriptive copy as the Facebook page long description ? Language is in Turkish which i don't speak so i'm not able to edit a new version of it just for FB and no budget to hire Turkish speaker to come up with something. So was going to copy & paste but that would be duplicate with HP obviously. How important is it to fill in 'Mission Statement' & 'General About' ? Especially if long description likely to already include that info ? I think long descrip is important for FB pages on seo etc etc but a good one eliminates importance of 'Mission' & 'General About', or is it still advisable to fill these in or are they just extra boxes for flexibility ? I take it when it comes to securing a vanity url (once we hit 25+ fans) for a foreign language version FB page it should ideally be brand name (which includes a keyword) in the local/target language ? The page name is already the brand name in English but since contains keyword is it best to rename into local target language similarly to the url for consistency and local targeting or better to keep one in Turkish and one in English ? Many Thanks Dan
Social Media | | Dan-Lawrence0 -
Way to reset Facebook page Reach sending patterns
I have a client that posts a bunch of really poorly formatted and nonengaging content on her a Facebook business page. This has caused her reach to be very low, despite having 9000 real followers. Due to a history of poor content and therefore low engagement Facebook just does not send her stuff out anymore. Is there a way to change that? I heard you could reset that notion by staying off the page for a couple of weeks and then beginning to post once more with better stuff. Is that remotely true?
Social Media | | Atomicx0 -
Facebook Outreach Tips - what to say
Hi, I've been shown how to do facebook outreach in my home town. I am a weight loss hypnotist. I was shown how to do outreach to possible home town clients using the facebook search feature. I go to the search and type in "Friends who like weight loss" And I get a couple of friends who have liked a major weight loss site After I've done that search, I look to the right in facebook. It has a bunch of dropdowns. I choose the same search parameters except I change it to "Live in Boise" (my town) and "Not my Friend". I get dozens of facebook users who live in Boise and are not my friends and are interested in weight loss. I can message these people (less than 30 a day) Here's the problem: I don't want to spam them. How do I get these people interested in my weight loss hypnosis program (I could really help them) by sparking up a conversation and not spamming. Everything I can think of saying seems manipulative. I don't know how to start a conversation and invite people to come in for a free sample session. My free sample session is 30 minutes and is free just to see if the client and I are a good fit. My website is bobweikel.com if that helps. How do I do this with the utmost integrity? Thank you.
Social Media | | BobGW0 -
Why can't anyone check in on my Facebook Page?
Once upon a time, we were able to check in at our office on Facebook. Then, one day, we just...couldn't. I didn't (at least intentionally) change any settings on the page. I can't seem to even find a setting for this. What happened, and how do I fix it? Thank you so much in advance. (Edited to include the Facebook URL) https://www.facebook.com/LegacyTravel
Social Media | | cathibanks0 -
How do I remove 11,000 spam facebook page likes received overnight complete with negative ratings/reviews?
My page has 11,000 spammed page likes. Only 250 are legitimate. These spammers are leaving 1 star ratings. Facebook is limiting the number of likes I can delete. I can report some fake ratings as spam but, again, facebook is limiting what I see. Any suggestions on how to proceed? Update: I found a work around for the negative ratings/reviews. I can change the category of my page to "other community" to remove the rating system from the page https://www.facebook.com/changeratings/posts/445471405558046. That still leaves me with 11,000 illegitimate likes that are stealing away from my 250 legitimate fans from seeing our posts. Should I start over?
Social Media | | jstallings0 -
Facebook Blocking Site
This is been a big annoyance for me. My site was on wordpress before and was infected with malware at one point. We were blocked by major AV, Google, and etc but we got the infection cleaned up quickly and got unblocked. Problem now is that Facebook, we are still blocked on. We try to post a link and says we are harmful. We got unblocked from facebook and we posted but than they blocked us again. We have submitted multiple requests on that form but got no answer. As a marketing agency, having our facebook page blocked to our site is bad. What can we do in this situation? We have no direct contact with anyone at facebook nor do they reply to our requests. I do own a .net to my domain, should we start using that instead of .com or what? We really need to find a way out of this. It is hurting our reputation.
Social Media | | Tech-Critic0 -
Changing FaceBook Username / url - do you retain your likes/fans
hi just a quickie, anyone know off hand when you change your FB username/url do you retain or lose the likes/fans ? cheers dan
Social Media | | Dan-Lawrence0 -
Realtors SEO and Active Rain
Does anyone know if active rain social network for realtors pass any link juice through the attached blogs features? They have both a free and paid service. Does anyone have any insight on this?
Social Media | | bronxpad0