Ah, the ‘like’. It sits there on every social media post; staring at you. Daring you to pass it by. So, like a good content reader, you click it and move on, right? So what just happened? What changed when you clicked the ‘like’?

Basically, nothing.

Your click joins the others who saw the post and mechanically hit the button. Here’s why ‘like’ doesn’t mean anything, anymore:

• It’s no longer a reliable metric for brand engagement. A viewer scrolling through a social media feed can, almost unconsciously, ‘like’ hundreds of posts an hour without paying attention to the poster or the message.

• It’s not just limited to Facebook or Instagram. LinkedIn, the leading social media platform for business, operates in much the same way, without the algorithms that rank posts on your newsfeed. In fact, LinkedIn has gone one step further, with the ‘endorsements’. With the click of your mouse, you can ‘endorse’ your contacts’ various skills; whether or not they apply. This effectively renders any ‘endorsement’ to the level of the ‘like’.

Do you need help increasing your brand engagement? Check out these social media marketing and website design packages from Will Sherwood, CEO of The Sherwood Group. They’ll help you stay ahead of the social media curve.

• Readers will often ‘like’ content posted by a friend, colleague, or client without reading it, so the poster will see that they saw the post. While this may gain the reader a modicum of good will, it’s still not tied to brand engagement.

• Even click-hounds, such as the Kardashian clan, don’t count their millions of social media ‘likes’ as brand loyalty.

• Yes, the ‘like’ is so superfluous that middle-school girls don’t pay much attention to it.

Rather than focusing on your Social Media ‘likes’…

Take a look at follows, comments, and shares. These are more reliable measures of engagement. They require a greater level of attention and activity on the part of the reader.

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This article is published by Will Sherwood | The Sherwood Group |Website Design | Graphic Design | Marketing Communications: The Sherwood Group has over 30 years of experience working with all sorts of companies, small and large. Our clients range from entrepreneurs to Fortune 500 firms, in nearly every business sector, from across the street to around the world (and yes, even Europe, China, and South America). Our goal is to create advertising,  graphic design, website design, and marketing communication that still looks fresh and relevant 10-15 years later. Our mission is to stir your imagination and leave your competition shaken and wondering,  Now what do we do?”  We are located in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

Do you need help growing your business? Click here to check out the social media marketing and website design packages from The Sherwood Group. We’ll help you capture new business and achieve your goals.

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