Wednesday, May 20, 2015

Would a Business Actually Do This?

I'm taking a minute away from gardening and other stuff to show you a screen shot of a spam email that I received yesterday.



I'm not sure what the advantage is to buying social media followers, but there must be one.  I told my daughter about this, and she said that there was recently a big purge of fake followers and accounts on Instagram.  

I took this as a learning experience, shook my head at the prospect of anyone falling for such a thing, then hit the 'Delete' button ... sending this to the trash, where it belongs.

23 comments:

  1. Now-I have heard everything! lol Kind of reminds me of the old joke about tying a bone around a kid's neck so the dog would play with him.....don't have any friends? BUY a few! xo Diana

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I don’t understand what benefit this would have … unless a business wants to brag about how many ‘likes’ they have on FB. Sort of like blog followers. Followers don’t equal readers, which also don’t equal active participants. I’m okay with that. I’ve never been one to seek popularity, and I’m sure not about to go out and try to BUY me some.

      Delete
  2. Advertising revenue, Connie. I'm sure you're aware that you can enable Google BlogSpot for "adsense" or whatever they call it, so you can make plenty of money on your blog and the more readers the more ad revenue. I did for a time and I think I made a grand total of 8 cents over a year (which they still owe me) and I quit when GardenWeb wouldn't let you link to your own posts if there was the potential of earning money off of it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I never thought about being prohibited from linking to blog posts containing ads on GardenWeb.

      Delete
  3. I think it can be useful to those who want to advertise... But for "normal people", what's the point in buying "fake friends", it's hard enough to get rid of those in real life!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm wondering if those fake social media friends would even pay attention to the advertising on the pages that they have supposedly likes.

      Delete
  4. I've heard of it, but not familiar with it personally. Just hope you didn't click any links!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. No link clicking here. There's enough stuff out there to get your computer and your information without bringing it on by clicking links. I don't even click links in emails that I'm sure are legit. If I need to do something, like update PayPal info and the like, I log into the account directly from my browser not from the email link.

      Delete
  5. G-A-R-B-A-G-E. Honestly, the crap that gets sent out these days is mind-boggling!

    Happy Wednesday!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hundreds of spam emails a day get sent to my Hartwood Roses account. Fortunately, my provider has a super spam filter and very little of it gets through to be downloaded to my inbox. Sometimes, depending on what I send, it even sends messages from ME to spam.

      Delete
  6. I have enough problems keeping up with "real" friends, I don't need any fake ones .... do I? ;-)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That's probably exactly it ... fake friends! Padding the number of 'likes' and, perhaps, fooling the media's algorithm for sending out posts to followers.

      Delete
  7. Yes! Please don't click on any links or you could get a virus!
    I don't understand it either, I mean if they are fake, they can't be profitable by clicking on peoples Adsense links because they don't exist.
    Hmmm.
    On Instagram I've gotten a few Followers that when I clicked on them to see if I knew them, they were just Ads.
    How irritating.
    I have a Tumblr account that I never use and the other day I saw I had a couple of Followers and I wondered how that could be?
    So I clicked on them and it took me to "their account" and I I was shocked. It was pornographic photos.
    When I realized what they were, my first thought was, Don't these girls have parents?" LOL! I must be really old.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I guess it’s all about numbers and clicks. I don’t click anything … well, that’s not completely true. I did click a link for a Living Social deal last month, and I got an awesome bracelet for $14 out of the deal. Maybe an Etsy link or two … but that’s all … I think. 

      Now you’ve made me wonder if I have any followers on my years-old-and-never-used Instagram account. I registered for Twitter years ago, too, and I have never used it either.

      Delete
  8. I used to get a lot of these. They do eventually end up in the Spam folder where they belong. Pride, I suppose, would make people want it to look like they have more followers than they actually do. Also, a lot of people believe that having more people following your FB (business/craft/etc.) page means that FB will make it a priority, thus show it to more people. Truth is, and always had been, that your posts are seen by more people because your followers interact with your posts. Fake people aren't going to do anything to help your views.

    ReplyDelete
  9. How crazy is that! I wish that whole ridiculous cycle of liking everything would just go away. It's nonsense, lol.

    ReplyDelete
  10. How many likes and followers seems to equate popularity and self worth to some ... and businesses who don't know better may get sucked into a scam like this. More likes equals more sales, right? NOT!

    ReplyDelete
  11. Replies
    1. It is. Some enterprising scammer has designed something to fill what appears to be a need for a small business. Businesses need customers and a good reputation, not fake social media friends.

      Delete
  12. And then there are your " friends" who don't comment often but read.
    Linda C in Seattle.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I believe that ANY friend who visits is a good friend!!

      Delete

Thanks for stopping by and reading what I share. Comments are welcome and very much appreciated. Spam and trolls are not!

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