Like many navigating the social media marketing sphere, I’ve come to accept that ‘likes’ - they matter, but at the same time… they don’t!
As one of the quickest, easiest ways of drawing a conclusion as to how credible a business is, and how likely a collaboration with said business is to draw a positive ROI, I kind of get the obsession!
There’s just one problem, though.
Despite the fact that a substantial number of heart-clicks lends well to SEO, visibility and all-round business quodos… it’s by no means the be all and end all.
It took some time to realise this fact, and it was consoling to realise I’m not to only copywriter to come to this conclusion (thanks Rowan Martin)
The way I look at it, now, is that a ‘like’ is rather like a compliment from a stranger on the street.
Nice to receive, but by no means a sole reason for showing up each morning!
When you think about it logically, for every one person who actually takes the time and energy to voice their admiration (whether in person or via a ‘like’), there are probably a dozen others who thought the same but ‘scrolled’ - or strolled - on by!
This is the reason why I’m no longer floating the value of my copywriting credibility on the one-tap exchange.
Of course, vanity metrics are an important a part of the social media furniture, and let’s be honest, when they do come… they feel pretty good (blame it on the dopamine!)
A fitting example, would be this recent post featuring my work with Saputo, which whether by luck, chance or something else, out-performed all prior posts by a digital mile!
As easy as it would have been from thereon, to become enslaved to the insights tab…I decided instead to see the stat for the chance, passing compliment that it was!
After all, what views and likes are not, is an accurate measure of how useful or relevant a piece of content is, nor of the magic that exists in the micro-pause that it might trigger, even if nothing else.
Truth be told, there’s a courting process in content to conversion, that can’t be rushed!
It begins with an eye-catch, a cursory glance, a double-take, and ultimately, potentially escalates into an add-to-cart, but all in good time!
With this in mind, we’d be inclined to say it’s the insta-underdogs - the billy-no-likes of the social playground - that we should not just be watching more closely, but which we should generally be thinking twice about, before underestimating in future.
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