With its growing influence in the travel space, hotel marketers understand the immense value of earning a legion of “Likes” on their Facebook page. This iconic symbol represents the new currency of social approval—an instant signal of popularity that allows a hotel to quickly establish a level of trust and credibility.
Such value has spawned an online industry where Facebook Likes can be bought in bulk for rock-bottom prices. This culture of buying fans is, however, often unethical in nature and frequently proves ineffective.
But there are legitimate ways to gain Facebook Likes that deliver altogether more impressive results. To delve deeper into this topic, we’ll outline what these methods are after discussing why two of the best-known methods of acquiring Facebook Likes should be avoided.
Method #1: Buying from Facebook Like Farms
Google ‘Buy Facebook Likes’ and you’ll find countless sites offering to deliver you thousands of new followers (often deceptively described as “Real Human Users” or “Active Accounts”) for extremely low prices. The cost alone should be enough to arouse suspicions as to the integrity of these services.
In reality, almost all of these Likes are not legitimate fans and are typically users from countries that aren’t even in your target market. Often, you’re effectively paying to gain the approval of an audience with no interest in your hotel.
This in itself might not seem such a huge problem if the goal is merely to establish the appearance of popularity on your Facebook Page. But buying Likes comes with some pretty major consequences.
One way to tell if a page has bought Likes: lots of likes but limited to zero engagement on the page’s posts. This can ring alarm bells with the genuine users you’re trying to influence, potentially losing you the very credibility you’re trying to earn.
