Social Media Friends
Most people in the West and most young people in the World have a number of social media friends. Some people are very selective about whom they befriend or ‘follow’ (I hate that term), and others are less so. This article is more about those users of social media who are less selective, because I have been thinking about how much we can rely on our social media friends.
The main social media for me are Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, but that won’t come as a surprise to many people who use the Internet. I use the Internet for eight to eighteen hours a day, depending on what stage of a book I am at, and I use social media to promote my books and keep in touch with my friends and readers, some of whom are the same people, although a writer doesn’t always know who his readers are.
Facebook Social Media Friends
I get about four to ten Facebook and three LinkedIn friend requests, and 150 Twitter followers a day on average. I think that that is probably about average for my level of Internet activity. I often join in with on-going discussions or/and start my own. Sometimes, I seek help from my social media friends in a special project, such as a book that I have put up for an award and would like friends to vote for. One thing that I will never ask my social media friends to do, is lie for me. For example, I will not ask someone to say that they have read one of my books when they haven’t.
So, with 100,000 Twitter followers, and thousands of Facebook and LinkedIn friends, you would think that I would win something, wouldn’t you?
I haven’t yet 🙂 , but that’s not what I am getting at. Why do some people complain about my request for help? After all, I only ask ‘friends’, all be they social media friends.
Some of the comments I have had are quite unbelievable. I’ll give you two:
“Stop begging and do your own promotion!” and
“I’m fed up with you random people asking me to do things for them!”
Then there are some who have tried to extract payment or favours for helping. One asked me to buy her book and post a review for a three-minute vote!
What I want to know is, what do these people think is the point of becoming social media friends? Is it to gain advantage, or are they just collecting people for their egos?
This is the second time in six months that I have asked my social media friends for help to market a book, and I have winkled out and unfollowed about a dozen each time (not because they didn’t help, but because of their attitude). That’s not bad out of thousands, but it serves to remind me that you cannot trust everyone who purports to be a friend.
You learn a lot when you seek help from friends, whether they be social media friends or more local ones.
If you would like to vote for my book Daisy’s Chain, please click this link and then: the NOMINATE button
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All the best,
Owen
PS: my PLR book The Internet is available from this link: The Internet
Podcast: Social Media Friends
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Dead Centre by Owen Jones
