How to Remove Fake Facebook Fans

Why Fake Facebook Fans Are a Big Deal

In April 2014 Facebook announced an update to their news feed algorithm that challenged Facebook page admins to improve their marketing efforts.

Find out how you can remove fake Facebook fans from your Page.

The bottom line? Pages with higher engagement and quality content are rewarded with greater visibility in the news feed, while pages with limited fan engagement and poor content lose positioning in the news feed.

What does this mean for you? If you have fake Facebook fans, they aren’t engaging with your content, and that is likely hurting your news feed visibility—there’s a good chance your real fans aren’t seeing your updates.

Buying likes is a sure way to end up with fake Facebook fans.

A few ways you can end up with fake fans—intentionally or unintentionally—are buying fans, not targeting giveaways or ads and even creating viral content. You may end up with 50,000 Facebook fans, but if 25,000 of them are fake, Facebook has probably already penalized you.

#1: Decide if it’s Worth the Effort

Ultimately, you want to remove fake Facebook fans and avoid the Facebook penalties. You have a few choices: remove the fake accounts, transfer your brand to a new Facebook page or simply ignore the fake accounts.

Depending on the number of fans you have, finding and removing fakes can be daunting—especially if you have thousands upon thousands of fans.

My rule of thumb: If your page is performing well and your posts are appearing in the news feed, don’t stress about the fake fans right now. If you have 50,000 fans and only a small percentage is fake, it might be best to ignore them.

However, if you have noticed poor reach and limited engagement, it’s time to make a change. Whether you have 50 fans or 50,000, you need to find, remove and ban the fake users.

#2: Find Fake Fans

Go to your Facebook page and click the Fans icon and select See All. The list you see only shows you up to 500 fans. If you see any fake accounts within this list of 500, click the gear next to the name and select Remove.

You can find fake fans via your page.

If you don’t see any fake fans or have coasted past the 500-fan mark and need to see a longer list, you’ll need to use Facebook’s Social Graph. Finding fans via Social Graph is extremely tedious and time-consuming (I recommend giving this task to an intern), but you can find just about every single fan using this method.

Open a new tab to use Social Graph (keep your page tab open as well). Simplytype “Fans of (insert page name)” in the search box and you’ll get a list of your current Facebook fans. As far as I can tell, this is the full list of your fans.

You can narrow the search results using the search filters on the right side or by typing the filter into the search bar (as in the example below).

Use Social Graph to find even more fake fans.

I suggest filtering the list by geographic location first to weed out potentially fake fans from countries with the highest number of fake accounts (Chile, Indonesia, India, Bangladesh, Brazil and the Philippines, according to Business Insider).

When you find a fake account, the simplest task is to report the spam account to Facebook. Click the arrow in the upper-right corner of the account result and select Report.

Filter your Social Graph results by location.

Of course, if you’ve tried to report someone before, you know that Facebook is slow to respond, if they take notice at all.

#3: Ban Fake Accounts for Good

This method requires a little more work on your part. You’re going to find the fake user’s Facebook ID and use it to replace one piece of code behind the scenes. Don’t worry, though, I’m confident you can do this.

Go back to the open Social Graph tab. Find the fake account you want to remove within the Social Graph and open up that fake user’s profile. At this point you should have two tabs open: the fake user profile and See All fans.

Now you need to find the user’s ID. Copy the profile’s URL then go to http://findmyfacebookid.com/ and paste the link into the box. The number you get back is the ID you will use to ban this fake account from your page. Copy the ID and go back to your See All fans tab.

In Google Chrome or Firefox right-click the gear next to the user and choose Inspect Element.

Use the Inspect Element feature.

A box will pop up with programming language and one line will be highlighted.

Find the highlighted line.

Right-click the highlighted line and select Edit as HTML.

Choose Edit as HTML so you can change the ID.

Select the user ID from within the coding box and paste the fake account’s user ID to replace the original one. Click on the coding box grey border to save the new user ID.

Switch out the IDs.

Head back to the People Who Like This tab and select Remove under the Settings arrow. A pop-up box will appear asking you if you would like to ban the fake account. Make sure it uses the fake account’s name. Select Ban Permanently,Confirm and you’re done!

To confirm that you have in fact removed the fake account, go back into the People Who Like This box and click the top menu. Select Banned and you should see the removed user.

Check to make sure the user is banned from your page.

If you’re looking to clean up your Facebook page without completely starting over, this is the workaround that can help you out.

Conclusion

A page with thousands of Facebook fans might make a powerful first impression, but if those fans aren’t interacting with updates, that page will have a horrible time positioning itself impressively in the news feed.

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Got Fake Facebook Fans? How to Protect Your Facebook Page

Fake Fans Hurt Engagement

Facebook has been actively trying to get rid of spam and phony profiles since early 2012, but like weeds, they keep coming back.

When Facebook detects spammy comments on your Page or likes from fake Facebook accounts (whether purchased or not), they remove your Page updates from the news feed. You end up losing a significant part (if not all) of your reach and engagement.

In mid-2013 and early 2014, Facebook made big changes to their news feed algorithm in an attempt to filter out spammy and poor-quality content. Pages that provide the most relevant content and have high true engagement have the best chance of appearing prominently in the news feed.

Facebook has been fighting spammers and fake profiles for years.

Facebook Pages with low true engagement, spammy posts, too many engagement requests and deceiving information are penalized and dropped from the news feed.

Beyond poor content, Facebook can tell the difference between phony fans and the real deal. If a Page tries to game the system (e.g., by buying likes), it’s just a matter of time before their content is dropped too.

Unfortunately, many small business owners have paid the price because they weren’t aware that buying likes is a bad business practice that results in penalties.

#1: Identify Fake Accounts

Whether fans were bought or not, you need to know how to identify them so you can remove them and avoid being dinged by Facebook. Most of the time you can tell if a fan is fake by looking at location, profile and cover photos and how often they interact with your Page.

Phony Facebook accounts usually show less activity then the average user. In fact, studies show that 43% of fake profiles have never even updated their Facebook status. If you click over to a profile and don’t see updates or if you notice the profile is associated with any like exchange groups, they’re probably spammers.

As a Facebook Page owner, you should know who your target demographic is and where they live. If you run a Phoenix plumbing company, but 2,000 of your total 3,500 Facebook fans are from Bangladesh or India, it should raise a red flag (because it’s definitely raising a flag for Facebook).

Yes, there are communities devoted to creating fake profiles and spamming Pages.

Pictures are also a big tipoff—you can tell a lot from a profile picture. Spammers and fakers usually have what I like to call ‘magazine profile pictures and cover photos.’ There’s always something off about them—they’re either too perfect or trying too hard to be inconspicuous.

It’s always a good idea to cross-check profile pictures or cover photos with Google Images. If the image turns up a few times on a few different social media accounts under different names, you’ve got yourself a fake account.

And keep an eye out for questionable female profile pictures. According to a Barracuda Labs study, fake profile users are female 97% of the time.

Another way you can figure out if an account is fake or spammy is by gauging their interaction. If a fan’s only purpose is to enter contests or like every Page under the sun (in exchange for money) without a general pattern, they’re most likely spammers.

#2: Remove Fake Fans

Removing fake accounts is actually the easy part. Simply switch to using Facebook as your Page (rather than as your personal profile).

In the Notifications bar click the Friends/Fans icon to see a list of your most recent new fans.

Check to see who has liked your Page recently.

Select See All at the bottom to see a complete list of all of your fans.

Remove fake and spam fans with just a click.

When you find a questionable profile, click on the gear and choose Remove. That’s it!

#3: Protect Your Page

Let’s talk about how you can avoid spammers and protect your Page from fake accounts. Reviewing your Page settings and setting country restrictions is a good start.

While I have yet to find credible sources providing details on which countries have the most spammers (if you have this information, feel free to post it in the comments), I can tell you from experience that Bangladesh, India and Indonesia seem to be hotbeds for this type of behavior.

I advise excluding these countries from your Page to avoid spammers and fake accounts. To do that, go to your Page settings and find Country Restrictions. You have two choices: “Only show this Page to viewers in these countries” and “Hide this Page from viewers in these countries.”

Restrict Page access to deter fake fans.

If you know you have an international clientele, choose “Hide this Page from viewers in these countries.” Type the names of the countries you want to exclude from your Page. No users from those countries will be able to see or like your Page.

However, if your clientele is local or limited to the US, choose “Only show this Page to viewers in these countries” and type in United States. That way only US Facebook users can see and like your Page.

Be careful about hosting giveaways and using hashtags. Giveaways are a double-edged sword. Sure, they’re a great way to increase engagement and/or likes, but they can be a magnet for fake accounts and spammers.

There are multitudes of websites dedicated solely to finding Facebook giveaways and providing that information (including direct links) to anyone and everyone who wants to enter, resulting in extra spam and fake fans.

Hosting a giveaway or contest could attract fake fans.

If you’re going to run a Facebook giveaway, know the audience you’re trying to reach and how you want them to enter. To avoid an influx of spammers, offer a prize that’s either local-only or appeals to your target audience (rather than a general audience).

It’s a good idea to use a third-party contest app that allows you to set strict entry guidelines. Some good app options are AgoraPulse, Woobox and ShortStack.

Many Page owners like to use hashtags when they post—especially if they’re hosting a giveaway. But beware: At any moment of the day, spammers are searching for popular Facebook hashtags like #contests or #giveaways. Those people literally go through each of the search results, like the host Page and enter the Facebook giveaway or contest.

When Facebook began using hashtags, marketers had mixed emotions. It’s become clear that general hashtags are a great way to attract the wrong crowd to your Facebook Page. (Interestingly, branded hashtags tend to lower the risk of attracting spammers and fake accounts.)

If you’re using Facebook ads, take advantage of Facebook’s sophisticated targeting options. You have complete control over your target audience, right down to their most personal information.

Facebook ads should target specific demographics in limited locations.

When developing your Facebook ad, be as specific as possible with your target audience, especially when it comes to location. Narrow your focus to include targeted cities first, and then move on to states.

If you target your ad well, you shouldn’t have any problem with spam or fake accounts.

Conclusion

Most Pages have seen a dip in overall engagement and reach due to Facebook’s newest news feed algorithm. But if you’ve noticed that your Page is really hurting, check to see if you have too many spam comments or fake fans and clean them up.

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How to Use the Facebook Pages to Watch to Track Competitors

Why Pages to Watch

The Pages to Watch feature in Facebook Insights allows you to watch other Facebook pages so you can compare their activity, engagement and audience growth to your own.

Pages to Watch is particularly handy if you want to see what’s working for your competitors or similar niche pages. You can see exactly what content they’re posting, how often they’re posting and when they’re posting—and the resulting engagement. Armed with that information, you can tailor your own updates accordingly.

You can watch any brand page on Facebook you want—you don’t even have to like the page. If you have 100 to 10,000 fans, you can create a list of up to 100 pages to watch.

Most page admins won’t need to watch that many pages, but it’s nice to have one place to keep track of your top competitors or brands that inspire you.

How to Set Up Pages to Watch

To find the Pages to Watch feature, go Insights and click on Overview. Scroll down the page to the Add Pages section (it’s just below the Your 5 Most Recent Posts box).

Facebook Pages to Watch monitors other pages’ content.

To create your list, you have to choose at least five other pages to watch, but I recommend making a larger list. The more pages you watch, the easier it is to see trends (e.g., whether short text updates outperform updates with links).

To add new pages to your list, just click the blue Add Pages button and type the name of a new page in the search bar. Once you find the page you’re looking for,click Watch Page to add it to your list.

Add Pages to Watch to gain more insight.

If you can’t find the page you’re looking for, check the page’s name again. Some pages may change their name or have a different name from their parent company.

Facebook automatically suggests new pages for you based on your past choices. These appear both in your pop-up search window and on the original Insights page.

Suggested Pages to Watch finds pages for you.

If you want to follow any of the suggested pages, you should know that Facebook sends those pages a notification that they’ve been added to a watch list. However, the page will not know it’s you watching them.

If you want to get a broader sense of what your fans respond to, it’s helpful to find pages your current fans already like, even if those pages aren’t related to your niche. It’s an easy way to see what other kinds of content your fans are interested in seeing.

To find those pages, log into your personal profile. In the Graph Search box, type in “pages liked by people who like [your page name]”. The results show all of the other pages your audience has also liked.

Facebook Graph Search helps you find pages your audience likes.

Now you know what other brands are showing up in your audience’s news feed, and whom you’re competing against for their attention. Add them to your list to see how they compare to the niche pages you’re watching.

Graph Search may be more useful to pages with a large number of followers because it shows trends across your entire audience. If your page has a lower number of likes, your results may be less consistent because there aren’t enough fans to show trends.

Spot Tactic Trends

The best part about Pages to Watch is that it tells you exactly what kind of content works both on and off your page. If you see that your watched pages are having more success with images than links or videos, try using more images. If all the top posts have very little text, then focus more on one short message per post.

An important factor of increasing page activity is knowing when and how many times to post. Sure, there are a lot of studies and research that give you a basic idea, but does that advice really hold true for your page?

Follow the successes of other Pages to find trends you can use to adapt your own strategy. Image: Shutterstock.

The truth is that each page is different. Some pages’ audiences may be sufficiently active that they can post multiple times per day; whereas other pages may only want to post once a week to get the best results. You have to test and retest to see what works for you.

To help you along, watch how often other pages post and how it affects their engagement. What time of day are they posting? What time of day results in the most comments, likes and shares? Experiment with your own page and post at those times as well to see if it affects your own page’s engagement.

You’ll likely find that some pages are more useful for helping you spot content and engagement trends. Don’t be afraid to add and delete pages from your list as necessary.

Compare Engagement

The Insights Overview page shows you the high-level numbers (e.g., total likes, number of posts and engagement, etc.), but to see the specific posts that are doing well, you’ll need to dive a little deeper.

Go back to the top of your Insights page and click the Posts tab to the right of the Overview tab. On the Posts page click Top Posts from Pages You Watch.

Posts this Week shows you what content works best.

Now you can see the top five posts for that week from the list of pages you watch. Even though you may be following more than five pages, Facebook only delivers the top five posts that received the most engagement. That means you may see multiple posts from a single page and no results from another.

Facebook shows you the exact post, the date it was published and the engagement it received. Click on the text of the post to see the full update and how many likes, comments and shares it currently has.

The information is useful because you want to track the content that’s working, not the content that’s mediocre.

If five posts per week aren’t enough for you, you have another option. You can like other pages using Facebook as your page (instead of your personal profile) to see the full stream of their posts in real time through your page’s news feed.

To switch from your personal profile to your page profile, click the down arrow at the top right of the Facebook toolbar. Under Use Facebook As, choose the page you want to use to like the new page. Go to each page on your Pages to Watch list and like their page.

Facebook news feed works for pages too.

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How Big Brands Keep Their Social Media Audiences Engaged

#1: Host a Video Contest

For the last seven years, Doritos has run its “Crash the Super Bowl” contest asking customers to create commercials for its crunchy treats. The incentive that really caught attention? The winner gets his or her commercial aired during the Super Bowl.

The response is huge. Hundreds of commercials are submitted. The company narrows it down to a pool of five, and then asks everyone to vote for their favorite.

The result is a viral campaign driven by finalists sharing their entry with friends and encouraging them to vote, as well as customers and fans who want to see the best videos (which are usually the funniest).

In 2013, Doritos brought the video contest to Facebook (they had previously used a microsite) and went beyond the success of all previous years.

Facebook increased entries for Doritos’ yearly video contest.

If you take a look at the Doritos Facebook page, this contest supplied content for months and generated a lot of conversation. Customers started watching videos, commenting on the commercials and asking about the rules.

This one post alone has almost 50,000 likes, 1,800+ comments and about 3,000 shares.

Doritos drums up votes for its video contest.

Use this idea: Create a video contest with a public voting aspect to draw people to your page. You can cull the entries down, and then ask the public to vote for the final winner.

While you may not be able to pay to showcase a video during the biggest sporting event of the year, do make the prize as appealing as possible.

Creating a video is a lot of work. If you ask customers to put in the time, they’ll need a reason to do so. You don’t have to go overboard, but the bigger the incentive, the more participants you’ll have.

#2: Share Customer Stories

Dunkin’ Donuts asked its Twitter audience to tell a story about how the company’s popular coffee fit into their everyday lives. The catch, of course, was that the story had to fit into 131 characters (entries had to include #mydunkin and that took up nine characters).

After combing through tens of thousands of stories, the company selected several winners and asked the tweeters to star in their own Dunkin’ commercial. The company shot the commercials, uploaded them to YouTube, shared them on Twitter and then asked for more stories.

Winners of the #mydunkin stories on Twitter got their own commercials.

Use this idea: Learn how customers use your product by asking them to share their story on Twitter (using a hashtag so you can easily track the entries).

It’s a challenge to tell a story in 140 characters, but the results are fun and usually witty. Since people love entertaining content, you’re likely to reach even more people who want to join in or comment.

Incentives always increase engagement, but the prize doesn’t have to be huge in this case. Offer a prize related to your business or something a little quirky to catch attention.

#3: Add an Element of Fun

You don’t always have to offer a prize in exchange for comments. Coca-Cola hosts a trivia question of the day to boost interaction. There are no prizes, but the tactic works.

General trivia questions work fine, but Coke uses out-of-the-box questions like, “Which of the following is worth the most Scrabble points?”

The company takes advantage of their fans’ curiosity by posting two updates: one with the trivia question and one with the answer.

Coke entices engagement with fun questions.

The result is that fans comment with their guesses on the first update, then come back to find out the answer and comment on the second update as well. The more fans interact with a page, the more likely it is to show up in their news feed.

With each trivia update, Coke is subtly promoting their product, getting double engagement and showing up more in their fans’ news feed.

Use this idea: Use trivia questions to share a little about your product or service. For instance, ask customers to guess what year your business started or what your top-selling product is. Be sure to give the answer in a separate update to bring them back!

#4: Ask for Customer Ideas

Nissan recently asked customers to tweet ideas about what kind of technology should be in the special version of the Juke NISMO (using #Jukeride). Since people love to share their opinions, suggestions started rolling in.

To keep the momentum going, Nissan uploaded behind-the-scenes videos showing customers how the company was using their suggestions.

Nissan asked fans for input, listened and showed the results.

Use this idea: Ask your customers and fans to help you improve one of your products, share ideas about products they’d like to see or come up with a name for a new product you’re about to roll out.

Nissan used Twitter, but the idea works on any social platform. Wherever your fans are most active, that’s where you want to start.

#5: Provide Recurring Content

Remember when your favorite journalist had a weekly column? Estée Lauder adapted that idea as a social media tactic.

Every Tuesday, the company’s creative makeup director, Tom Pecheux, offers a makeup tip on Facebook. The #TomsTuesdayTip campaign offers advice, features a picture of a related beauty product and links to a purchase page or blog article about recent trends.

Estée Lauder consistently offers makeup tips.

Estée Lauder created their own hashtag, but there are established hashtags that achieve similar engagement.

The weekly column receives a lot of comments and questions and the company responds to them as quickly as possible. The weekly tip format, along with company interaction, gives fans confidence that the company is listening to them, which results in more conversation.

Estée Lauder talks to fans who comment.

Use this idea: Come up with a weekly feature using a consistent hashtag. You can create your own or ride the wave of an existing hashtag to get things started.

#TBT (Throwback Thursday) is a popular one. Just post a picture of the early days of your company, product or a related topic. Funny pictures tend to have the most comments and shares.

Whichever option you choose, be consistent and offer valuable content on a regular basis. If you set the expectation of a weekly share and don’t come through, fans lose interest.

To make it easier, use an editorial calendar to gather ideas, then use a tool like HootSuite or Facebook’s scheduling option to post updates automatically.

If you start a weekly topic, begin by posting on your most popular social profile. When the feature is established, use it to push fans to another platform where you’re offering a new weekly feature. You can grow your conversation and fan base on each social channel.

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