How Many Facebook Friend's Are Enough?

This post is in response to a discussion on JimTurners fan page, click here to view the original post How many facebook friends are enough?

Hi Jim

I would just like to add another opinion and explain a few of the reasons why someone would want a large network. Having a large friend list on its own isn't actually much use because facebook doesn’t allow you to mail more than 20 friends at a time and I guess it's clear from what others have posted it all depends what business you are in. I fully agree of the pointless nature of rushing to grow to 5000 friends just for the sake of it and without some end goal or reason for adopting this method

As a strategist I want to explore all areas without judgement to be able to asses the merits of each type of friending strategy. If you want to advise others you need to fully understand the pro's and cons and not condemn something you don't fully understand just because you haven't personally explored it. I guess with facebook this is a problem as you have to make a choice, you can’t do both, and this is all the more reason why sharing knowledge and information is important and why I think this discussion is so useful

Malcolm Gladwell in his book the tipping point said that researchers looked at many factors regarding human networks and even analysed the maximum size of tribal villages across all cultures throughout history and the number they came out with was 148. because this was the maximum number of people you could possibly maintain a relationship with. In modern times and by using technology to aid and speed communication I suspect that Mari is correct in her figure of 250 - 500 people

I myself have grown my network rapidly over the past 2 months, this is just how it happened and was due to the people I came in contact with. I think after about 400 friends I couldn't keep the same rigorous checking and personal messaging that I had until then. I was making a very targeted list with a specific objective in mind. As I grew larger my network has become infiltrated with more untargeted friends who added me just because I was quite visible in certain groups. After 700 friends I stopped adding any new ones and my friend list has grown on its own. What I have found is that the initial 400 friends have created a core of quality in my network that have attracted similar people so even though I am not targeting them they are attracted to me. Since most of the people who friend me are friends of friends and not random people who just stumbled on my profile. The people who I need to pay attention to naturally rise to the top. I just ignore all the background noise and concentrate on developing certain key relationships

The advantages of having a large network comes through the viral effects of the friend feed. If you have a product or service that you want to promote then under certain circumstances the further you can reach the better. Not everyone who uses facebook for business is looking for high end coaching clients or has a very small niche that they need to develop very personal relationships with. I think there is a very large area in between this and Macdonalds. And it is short sighted to infer that everyone who chooses to develop a large network is going to be a spammer. I also think that for many people one half of their business might need a small intimate network and the other a much larger less intimate network. Anyone who makes information products would always want to reach the widest audience possible. So I believe many people are split in their opinions because their businesses are not one dimensional and they might have different needs at different levels.

Having a large network means that if you want to launch a group on facebook and if you have targeted your friends carefully you will be able to grow your group quickly and the momentum of that growth can push your group to become viral. Take a look at the group "join the fight against cancer", it has 184,000+ members and the admin can fully control what is shown in the links, the videos and pictures, this could be used as a very powerful traffic generator and all those impressions are for free. The key is how to get your group to hit critical mass where it just grows on its own. Since facebook raised the limit from 1200 to 5000 this gives most group admins a lot of scope for developing a relationship with a large number of people. As long as you give valuable content people don't mind when you try and promote something and if they do they can always leave your group and join another one.

I think most people tend to forget that this is just a tiny corner of facebook that we inhabit and there is potential for many people to service different strata of the facebook population. The marketing tools for creating targeted lists in any niche are amazing and this has barely even been tapped. Too many are people trying to make a fast buck without thinking about the damage this does to their reputation. One friend likened it to a room full of car salesmen all trying to sell cars to each other.

I haven't even mentioned the power of working together with other people with large networks and leveraging each other for mutual benefit. Or the benefits of having an integrated network where all your friends are friends with each other and what benefits that can give. That will be explored in later blog posts

Attention Grabbers!!

If a complete stranger came and knocked on your front door and demanded that you go with them to look at their new car or dragged you out of your house and forced you to go inside their new shop, don't you think you might get a bit upset. Why is it then that so many people act that way on facebook

Why should I give you my attention?

How many times have you had someone send you a friend request on Facebook and then straight away before you've had time to take a second breath they have asked you for something, demanding your atention, whether its to check out their group, look at their website, join their MLM program or Get rich Quick scheme. What these people maybe fail to realise is their approach is getting them entirely the opposite results than they might expect. The reason being is they fail to see the message they are sending from the other side or think a little bit about who they are sending to. Without having this view you assume that the whole world will naturally be interested in everything you are doing and you demand that they give you attention.

Relationships first - deals second

Trying to sell yourself or your products without first taking the time to build some sort of relationship is not going to be the most effective strategy in today's web 2.0 world.

Serve others first and you will be rewarded

When you friend someone don’t ask them for something straight away, take the time to send a personal message and ask what you can do to help them. If you want to get your self really noticed then you are going to have to learn to give before you receive. This will instantly set you apart from everyone else and will show that you are actually interested in them and not just in serving yourself or your business. Serving others is one of the highest virtues you can adopt and is one of the quickest ways to have your own needs met as well. People will always remember you in a positive light and that is what can influence them to open your emails, listen to your sales messages and buy your products or services in the future. Attention is one of the most valuable commodities that all businesses are competing for.

Don't be too aggressive

Once you have their attention and you have started a conversation you can decide if you want to mention what It is you are promoting. If you are too aggressive in your marketing or sales approach you can turn people off very quickly It's easy to spot people who are not genuine so be very careful here and make sure you do this in a skilful way, a casual mention of what you have to offer can be much more powerful than the direct approach. People hate being sold to but they do like to buy. If you position yourself in the right way, you can be the person they choose to go to when they are ready.

Consider Starting you own group

If you want to get a targeted group of people all in one place then consider forming your own group, you can invite all your friends and in this way, only the people who are interested will be subjected to your marketing messages and they have the option of leaving the group at any time. Selling directly to new friends via their profile, instant messenger or wall is one of the quickest ways to start losing friends and as spam becomes more widespread more people are becoming less tolerant of unsolicited messages in their inbox.

I join a lot of groups to see what they have to offer, one thing I have noticed is the difference between how some of the group leaders treat their members.

The Trusted Friend

Some Facebook groups send me a continual stream of messages promoting this product or that service, I have to admit that I tend to ignore most of them, Its like I almost don't see or hear anything of what they are communicating, I filter it out and it just goes in the noise and distraction file. There are however a few group leaders who have adopted a different strategy, they keep sending me useful information and good links to things I am interested in, and they have a totally different way of communicating. It's not that they never try and sell me something its just they do it in a different way so I don't mind because I have placed them in a different file, that of the trusted friend. If you are networking, planning on using facebook to promote your business or you would like to start your own Facebook group in the future, I think there is an important lesson to learn here.

Share a Part of Your Life

Take Travis Greenlee as a good example, he was the person who inspired me to start the Facebook Made Easy group, His videos impressed me so much that I wanted to share them with as many people as possible. He has carefully positioned himself as a thought leader, and highly respected businessman here on Facebook, a person to look up to and one who sets the standards for others to follow. Notice how he is also sharing a part of his personal life too, uploading his home videos. This is a great relationship building strategy and allows you to connect in a way that you could never do personally to so many people.

Another person who always sends interesting content is Russell Birtwistle, He runs his business from Thailand , I look forward to his network marketing group emails because he shares a lot and tries to educate you to understand how he approaches his business and what tools he uses to stay successful and to stand out from the rest of the crowd. Just today he sent an enticing email describing his lifestyle and his love of fine food and golf. This style of marketing is very effective, how many people do you think there are who would like to trade places and live a similar life in paradise. These are all his potential customers who are being reeled in by his interesting stories, his direct honesty and transparent openness.

Another Facebook Leader who I admire is the copywriterr Jim Turner. Last week I was reading an article in his blog , Pit Bull Marketing where here he was talking about these same issues. I asked Jim if I could quote directly from his article and he agreed

"First off, your group or JV opportunity has to be focused on something that I’m interested in. If you can’t get past that hurdle, forget it! "

"People in general are very self-centred. So when you put together your pitches or group invitations you need to make sure you let the reader know what’s in it for them… and it has to be believable.

Once you get me in your group – the real work starts. You see, now you’ve got to keep me there. The best way to do that is keep feeding me information that I can use and benefit from… not more and more pitches."

"I would like to hear from you no more than a couple of times per week. Anything above that and you run the risk of annoying your members. Annoyed members hit the remove link real fast."

"it’s important that you know that I’m not against offering a product or service to me or your group members. I realize most of us are in business – that means that at some point a financial transaction must take place, or we won’t be around very long.

But be willing to provide training and educational resources pertaining to how to be successful with what you’re promoting."

To read the whole article you can follow this link - or you can joins Jims group Social Media Marketing Mastermind

Don't be a Spammer

So remember don't keep messaging your group 3 times a day. Most people find it annoying and if you are not giving any value or content and only self promoting what you are doing is Spam and not only will Facebook flag your account and send you a warning but you will also damage your reputation with all your friends. Spend the time to develop relationships with your group and your friends. Be respectful, these are real people so treat them that way.

Build Solid Foundations

Don't think of Facebook and social networking only as a way to make a quick buck. Think about it as a long term business strategy , lay the foundations in the right way and you will have people visiting your house every day. Ignore this vital stage and whatever you build will likely come crashing down around you and all your hard work wasted.