8 Reasons Your Page Isn’t Being Liked On Facebook

To follow up on my popular posts, 8 Reasons I Won’t Follow You on Twitter, I am branching out to the other platforms to talk about why people don’t follow or connect.  Today we are going to talk Facebook.

Have you ever wondered why your Facebook page doesn’t get as many “likes” as you think it should?  After all, with over 1 billion users, you would think you would have thousands of fans.  Unfortunately there are reasons that your page may not be getting the likes you think it deserves.

Here are 8 of the reasons your page isn’t being “liked” on Facebook (not in any particular order)…

1. Your cover photo violates Facebook’s Cover Photo Rules.

Facebook has a list of rules for a page’s cover photo.  In early 2013, Facebook updated their cover photo rules.  The only rules now is that there is to be no more than 20% text in your photo.  I know of many social media professionals who do not follow pages who violate cover photo rules.  It’s part of walking the talk.  Take a look at yours – is it following the rules?

**As of 2015, Facebook doesn’t seem to care about the amount of text in cover photos. This has seemed to have fallen to the wayside.

2. Your page run contests that do not comply with the Facebook contest rules.

Facebook updated the contest rules in the Fall of 2013. Previously contests that required you to comment or like a post were forbidden.  Now that are perfectly legal. However, you still cannot require someone to share a picture of post to be entered to win. Despite  these changes, there are pages that still do “Share to Win” contests.

3. You never post.

The purpose of having a Facebook page is to engage and build relationships with your followers.  If you never post, you won’t make that connection.  If you ask me to “like” your page and I go to it and you haven’t posted in over a week or not at all, I won’t “like” it.

4. Your content is not related to your industry.

If someone “likes” your page, they are liking it for industry-related content.  They are not liking it for the cute cat pictures or random memes.  If you are in the social media industry, for example, I would want information about social media, not 15 inspirational posts or cartoons that have nothing to do with social media.  Keep your page’s content relevant.

5. You “liked” my page but are only interested in swapping “likes” not building a relationship.

Facebook page admins will participate in Facebook Fan Page Parties looking to connect with others – either in their industry or those pages that interest them. When I participate, I am not interested in “like” swapping, meaning liking that page so they will like yours and increase your like count, I am genuinely interested in what you have to say.  Unfortunately, not everyone is like that.  If you post on my page just to ask me to “like” yours back, I won’t.  It’s an indication that all you are interested in is my “like”, not the value I could bring as an active follower.

6. You post your page link all over my Facebook page without my consent.

This one goes with #5.  Even if you are not a fan of my page, please do not post your link(s) all over my page.  This happened to me today.  I posted a quote and someone took the time to post a link to his page under it.  Trust me, that comment was quickly marked as spam.  Not only it is unprofessional, it’s also not social (to steal a line from a friend of mine).

7. Every post on your page is a sales pitch.

I understand everyone has something to sell – that’s why we have fanpages, right?  Social media is about engagement and relationship building.  People do not want to be sold to.  If I found your page and all of your posts were “Today only get _________ for $29.99!” or “We are proud to offer the best ____________ services.  Call us today 555.55.5555!” I won’t follow that page.  That shows me that you are all sell-sell-sell and not interested in engaging with me.  It’s good to keep a good ratio of self-promoting posts and non self-promoting posts.  For every 8 non self-promoting posts, it’s okay to post 2.

8. Your posts are full of spelling and grammatical errors.

If your posts are full of misspellings and grammatical errors, it simply does not look professional.  Learn when to use “it’s” as opposed to “its” for example.  Facebook does spell check, so look for those squiggly red lines before posting. Would you want a prospective client seeing that on your page?  I didn’t think so.

These are just 8 simple reasons people may not be “liking” your Facebook page.  Every person is difference and has their own reasons for doing or not doing something.

Share with me – what is one reason you have for not “liking” a Facebook page?