For most marketers, the number of likes that their page and posts get is an important piece of information. It can help to determine the effectiveness of marketing strategies, and even help provide new users with the confidence they need to hit the like button themselves.
According to a recent post by Facebook, however, the likes on your pages are going to be dropping over the next few weeks. This is because Facebook is going to stop counting likes from inactive or deactivated accounts.
According to the post, “Over the coming weeks, Page admins should expect to see a small dip in their number of Page likes as a result of this update. It’s important to remember, though, that these removed likes represent people who were already inactive on Facebook.”
So, while this will impact the total number of likes you have on your pages, it won’t impact the actual user interaction that you might expect to see. In addition, Facebook said that the total drop should be fairly small. Of course, small is relative and it will depend on how and when a page gained likes. Some marketers may notice something more significant than others. The update will begin rolling out on March 12th, and will take a few weeks to reach all Pages on Facebook.
Whatever the case, it is important to be aware of the change so you don’t mistakenly think it is an actual drop in real people who are liking your pages.
You can read the full blog post from Facebook HERE.
