How Not to Get Blacklisted on Facebook
I know that several of our AFix members have had trouble with bans on their Facebook accounts, so I thought the tips in this article by George Beall on Business.com might be helpful.
Beall discusses shadow banning before moving on to his experiment with creating a fake account.
Shadow banning is the same as ghosting on Craigslist. You can still post, comment, like etc. but your actions won't be seen by anybody. They won't actually get posted and you won't know until you look for them and can't find them. This typically happens because you've been reported, or FB's algorithm doesn't like your suspicious link(s).
According to Beall, FB uses a similar technique to Google to avoid ranking hacked/fake accounts:
- checking user authority
- number of times a link is shared
- timeframe of the comment
- etc.
FB knows that marketers try to game the system and how.
In Beall's experiment with creating fake accounts, he realized that he had problems in trying not to get red flagged by FB:
- not a large enough supply of random pictures of people that he could pretend were him
- not enough time, nor the desire to do all the liking, posting, commenting, etc. necessary to pretend to be real and grow organically
After getting more than 1,000 friends, his account died, killed off by FB. He'd been shadow banned.
The Solution
Beall suggests you put extreme planning into your fake accounts. Make your profiles and actions seem very real. That will give you the best chance of avoiding FB's ban hammer.
My Commentary
Personally, I am uncomfortable with the idea of creating fake accounts, that's just not me, I'm not very adventurous when it comes to breaking rules.
However, we have a number of awesome marketers here who are busting their butts in this area, so hopefully something in this post will help, not only them but everyone using FB.
I know that several of our AFix members have had trouble with bans on their Facebook accounts, so I thought the tips in this article by George Beall on Business.com might be helpful.
Beall discusses shadow banning before moving on to his experiment with creating a fake account.
Shadow banning is the same as ghosting on Craigslist. You can still post, comment, like etc. but your actions won't be seen by anybody. They won't actually get posted and you won't know until you look for them and can't find them. This typically happens because you've been reported, or FB's algorithm doesn't like your suspicious link(s).
According to Beall, FB uses a similar technique to Google to avoid ranking hacked/fake accounts:
- checking user authority
- number of times a link is shared
- timeframe of the comment
- etc.
FB knows that marketers try to game the system and how.
In Beall's experiment with creating fake accounts, he realized that he had problems in trying not to get red flagged by FB:
- not a large enough supply of random pictures of people that he could pretend were him
- not enough time, nor the desire to do all the liking, posting, commenting, etc. necessary to pretend to be real and grow organically
After getting more than 1,000 friends, his account died, killed off by FB. He'd been shadow banned.
The Solution
Beall suggests you put extreme planning into your fake accounts. Make your profiles and actions seem very real. That will give you the best chance of avoiding FB's ban hammer.
My Commentary
Personally, I am uncomfortable with the idea of creating fake accounts, that's just not me, I'm not very adventurous when it comes to breaking rules.