Facebook Is Deleting Pages At Alarming Rate Without Saying Why To Page Owners

So once again Facebook is at it again this time deleting Fan Pages and Business Pages with out giving any reason why. to the page owners who have worked very hard over the years to build up their pages. 

In 2007, Facebook launched their fan pages component, which allowed Facebook users to create fan pages for all types of interests and purposes.

You can create pages for small businesses, fan pages to bring fans of a certain character or superhero together, or simply to post/share content you enjoy with others. 

Within the past few weeks, Facebook has eliminated thousands of pages for no apparent reason, and has yet to issue an official explanation for their actions. I can assure you that many, if not all, of the pages eliminated were not erased for standard/regular reasons (fake traffic, spam, etc).

This was a removal of thousands of pages with at least 100 million fans in total (all active users and real people) and as I said, no formal notice or explanation has been given by Facebook.

The reason this is news is not simply because Facebook made a massive page sweep/purge and didn’t say anything. It is because the page owners behind these pages, many of whom have been building them for 5 years plus, suddenly had their entire followings and fan bases removed from their lives for no reason and they just don’t know what to do or who to complain to.  

There are thousands of page owners terribly upset, especially because they have been left in the dark as to why this happened. Additionally, many page owners used their pages to generate income in legitimate ways. Selling merchandise and posting Facebook-approved sponsored links are a couple popular examples.

This is a case of a few clicks by a development team at a major tech company resulting in thousands of individuals and families experiencing a direct loss of income, not to mention the enjoyment and ability of simply sharing content you like with others.

Now I know a lot of you will be saying good less crap in the news feed. Guess what Facebook has already limited page reach over the past few years so that is not the reason. Also they have deleted all types of pages ranging from funny joke pages to pages that support Autism and yes even Band Pages. NO PAGE IS SAFE RIGHT NOW. 

This also not the first time that Facebook has done this last year they did the same thing to 1000’s and page owners back then never got their pages back or a reason why their page deleted. The Daily Dot was the only one to report on it back in August

This time page owners are fighting back. One irate page owner has started a group called #POWERTOTHEPAGES and has even started a petition trying to get enough people to sign it and try and get a proper answer for the page PURGE and their pages back. 

Page owners deserve better and deserve answers. Some people have lost their very livelihood and some people are disabled or even single mothers trying to make a few dollars to support their families by selling their homemade products or even Avon. Yes they don’t discriminate. they hit everyone because they don’t have people doing the deleting they have computers that do it. 

I have contacted Facebook for an answer on this issue but have not received an answer. Of course they never do give answers on why they do things and that is the problem. They are not a privately held company anymore. This is a publicly traded company and they should be held accountable now but it is business as usual there.

Don’t believe me look at all the criticism they went through during the years suppressing Conservative stories, harassing mothers who breastfeed and the list goes on and don’t get me started on the privacy issues. 

So I am asking you all to get the word out to all the people and press you know and lets try to have Facebook held accountable and give page owners the answers they deserve. YES I AM ONE OF THE PAGE OWNERS. 

Facebook Timeline Is Here For All Business / Fan Pages

Facebook Timeline Is Here For

All Business / Fan Pages !!! 

Well I have and so have alot of other people who the Timeline was coming for Business Pages / Fan Pages and it is now here and it will become Mandatory on March 30th 2012.

There are good things to it and there are some serious issues with it that I hope Facebook corrects during this trail period or basically pages will be irrelevant even more than they are becoming already.

First off it is great for a page to Visually show off but then things get a bit dicey. The fan interaction has been curtailed as fan posts are now lumped into I big box that must be expanded to see what they are saying to you.  I don’t why Facebook would do that being how they want fans to interact and post or at least so they say. Page admin posts show up just fine as well as the comments. Now though if a fan post something it get lost unless the page admin re-posts it for them.

Lots of page owners are going to hate this with a passion as they rely on fan page posts to keep informed on things from the fans and the fans also like it to. Admins will really have to work a bit harder to keep up to date with the fans if they keep it like this.  This really hurts Musicians, Gamers, Small Businesses, Radio Stations as well a number of others but businesses who don’t allow fan posts this is a godsend as they don’t have to police their walls so much or to be precise don’t have to care as much what fans post except for comments.

Now let’s get to the apps a page uses, they get a bit lost too and the landing pages business love so much and have spent good money on become obsolete and a waste unless Facebook makes some changes. This will really hurt those who use those pages for fan engagement/ contest and widget engagement.  Now if a fan want to see what page has to offer as far as apps and engagement they have to click the little arrow next the to the last little picture and the apps will drop down.

Now Facebook did add some good features for page owners and fans.  The feature for page owners is the Admin Panel which I must say is very nice and clean and really easy to use. They have added notifications there so you can actually see them as well as who has like page to better manage the fans and ban them if they post in appropriate content. They have also added a little insights box for a quick view chart.

They added tabs on top right of Admin Panel so you can manage page and this brings you to the way we are used to editing page so that hasn’t changed, using Facebook as page feature, Activity log and seeing the banned users.  The tab next to it is Build an Audience and this is where you can Invite friends, share the page and create an ad. The last tab is the help tab which is basically useless as we all know as their help center is so out of date the info there is not worth reading. Then the hide tab which just closes out the new section.

They did add a nice feature which makes it easy for your fans to message the PAGE directly and this I like but I know some wont as they will get hit with tons of messages. Next to that is the little gear wheel where you can go add page to favorites, report bad pages, Share the page & even give Facebook Feedback on What You Think of new Pages ( I have a Feeling Lots of people will use this one even though Facebook  probably don’t read the feedback).

So there you have it in a nutshell. Bottomline here is that the New Pages need alot of work to make them Fan friendly and it will take a while to get used to. Remember you don’t have to convert them now you have until March 30th then you will get it whether you want it or not so I recommend you try it now so you can get used to it.

Don’t be surprise to see Facebook make it more fan friendly as the Businesses are the ones who spend money advertising on Facebook and Facebook will ultimately do what they want to keep the money coming in. I feel bad for page owners who rely on Fans posts to generate likes and traffic because it will be tougher on them as well as the gamer’s who use pages to be social, like Mafia Was Players who use them as WAR Pages and show how they are doing in a the game wars, as those post will be lost now and harder to find. Looks Like Groups may become relevant for them again.

Here’s the Facebook’s links to their Learn About Facebook Pages & Introducing New Facebook Pages and if you are looking for help with your business page I recommend our friends over at Talking Finger as they are very good at helping businesses get the most out of pages.