Troopers

And the point is...

TheBOSman

That it isn't really an accomplishment to basically pay for 1 million likes on Facebook @:-).

Troopers

Perhaps if you isolate the FB likes with the rest of the business.

What's the hesitation/issue when a business spends dollars on marketing?

Adam1222

I don't think there's an issue of spending dollars on marketing, but suggesting that that is itself a measure of success. "We've produced 6 commercials that have reached 1 million homes" is not an indicator of a great product, but of a marketing budget.

Troopers

I suppose you can discount any business/great product on that basis.

TheBOSman

It's a business, not a popularity contest. 1 million likes in and of itself means jack ..... Monetizing those likes is different.

Troopers

Million likes means jack for for a small divorce attorney for men only or a mom and pops accounting firm in suburbia. It is a popularity contest for e-commerce/blog businesses. It's very likely that TPG received significantly more app clicks with the paid FB likes.

Astrophsx

Why would paid FB likes = more application sign ups?

I am assuming that he didn't acquire his 'likes' through paid advertisements... Looking at the numbers I think it is more than likely that he purchased the likes from a service that utilizes fake accounts to boost his numbers. I'm sure if we had access to his analytics we'd find a large percentage of his fan base accesses Facebook via mobile device in India.

Troopers

Why would TPG pay a FB likes farm which results in zero potential revenue? Makes no sense...Brian is not dumb, give him the benefit of the doubt. TPG needs to continue to spend on marketing to stay on top.

Raffles

It generates lots of revenue. People foolishly take social media likes as a proxy for whether to advertise. It also persuades the media that you are an authority.

If you had fake testimonials or made false claims about your sales you would be in trouble. For some reason faking your social media stats is seen as acceptable.

Astrophsx

He spends thousands of dollars on YouTube advertising his videos which have no credit card referral links, so how likely are people going to his website via the videos and clicking on a referral link? The low audience engagement would tell me not likely. So why would he do this and potentially pay a company for fake likes on YouTube? See the response below... it makes him look like the 'authority' or 'thought leader' in the miles/points space. Brian Kelly wants to venture out into a travel TV career... I'm only guessing with the $$$ he has made from the website he wants to have to have the notoriety of being the Anthony Bourdain of miles.

I'm no expert in social media, but I have a hard time believing he's seen much ROI on his YouTube campaign. He basically purchased views (via advertising the link to his videos) and gets very view comments or thumbs up on his videos. The same with his FB page... he has over a million likes.. yet hardly any comments or likes on things he posts.

Troopers

Now we're getting somewhere...

FB farm likes gets zero ROI...not even the slightest chance to earn a penny.

Whereas other marketing vehicles (paid FB ads, YouTube, giveaways, etc) provides an opportunity for return on the marketing investment.

The cost/benefit of the marketing vehicles is an entirely different discussion. $100 in FB ads gets 1000s(?) of views/hits...just one app click pays for itself. YouTube views are probably very low ROI.

Suggesting TPG buys farmed likes is ridiculous.

Astrophsx

Why would it be ridiculous? We just pointed out a reason why he might have purchased likes. I'm no social media expert, so feel free to correct me here, but he has over 1 million likes on Facebook yet he gets hardly any comments on the items he posts and ~100 likes on each story. Is this common for a page that has this many likes.

You say it is ridiculous, but I just gave a data point that they are pouring thousands of dollars into YouTube adverts that point to his YouTube videos and not to his webpage. They are doing this I assume to make his videos look popular in hopes that he can some day spin it into a travel TV show. If they are wasting money on that it isn't far fetched that they'd pay directly for likes on Facebook. You would agree that MillionMileSecrets is in the top 3 miles/points right? That page has ~21,000 likes on FB and has a HUGE advert campaign on Facebook targeted to frequent travelers.

Where do the FB ads point to? The Facebook page of TPG or TPG.com? If it is TPG.com those 1,000's of views don't help his Facebook numbers.

Troopers

Just checked the pages that I personally like on FB: a company, an athlete and a product/service (category per FB):

Page, number of total likes, number of likes in last 3 postings:

Nikon, 10.6M, 102, 27, 44
Jeremy Lin, 3.7M, 8.9k, 51k, 46k
American Express, 6.3M, 14, 4, 25


It's ridiculous because the notion to purchase fake likes is ridiculous.

As previously stated, YouTube provides an opportunity for return. So does FB ads. So does giveaways. So does reader gatherings. What does useless fake FB farm likes get TPG? That's the difference.

You may be right that his end goal is to have a travel TV show or whatever, but buying useless fake farmed likes will not aid in that goal whatsoever. The other methods will help achieve that goal in many ways.

HUGE gap btw TPG and MMS, not even in the same league. TPG has reached quasi-celebrity status.


I've seen both. Ads pointing to TPG.com provides for app click (which may also result in FB likes). That's why it makes sense to buy FB ads, not FB farm likes which gets nothing.

sbm12

A senior executive in one of the areas I cover as a journalist just bought 10k twitter followers, specifically so he could appear more authoritative in his online persona. Apparently having 300ish followers wasn't really the aura he wanted to project.

Sadly, it would be unprofessional of me to call him on it in public so I just have to be snarky and oblique about it in other fora.