It is without a doubt that nowadays organisations spend billions of euros every year for their activities in social media and their main justification for these investments is that by attracting more followers, they will eventually increase sales.  On the other hand, in a relevant survey of 427 marketers at US companies showed that nearly 80% of them, are not able to quantify the value of their social media campaigns. 

As Likes are still largely regarded as a sign of brand loyalty and growth opportunity, the million-dollar question that finally arises is: What is the value of a Like?  Brands have discovered that people that make contact and follow them in social media platforms, eventually spend more with them compared to those that don’t, but there is largely a confusion between cause and consequence with regards to this relationship.  In simple words, is it all about getting people to follow a brand and therefore buy more, or people that feel positive about this brand are more likely to find, follow and like it in the first place and buy more than those who don’t?

Back in 2017, Harvard Business Review did the most comprehensive survey on this issue, as 18.000 people took part in experiments to examine the impact of Likes on behaviours by a user, or people within this user’s social circle.  What came out as a result was that the act of liking a brand does not influence a customer’s behaviour or lead to increased purchases, nor it produces significant influence on their family and friends.  Liking is considered a weak endorsement and does not have the same influence as a real-world recommendation.

Moreover, the study also concludes that “pull marketing” efforts (i.e., drawing customers in social media channels) are not as effective in causation compared to “push marketing” (i.e., advertising and promotion) and it suggests that both tactics should be used.     

On the other hand, with so many people active in social media, Likes and shares do offer a real value in providing a sense of legitimacy around a brand, as marketeer Brad O’Brien claims in a relevant article.  It is very often that as consumers we do look at social pages of brands and pay attention to the number of followers as a kind of “social proofing”.  On top of that, the group of customers that go to the trouble of finding a brand in social platforms are undoubtedly provide high value to an organisation, as they are considered to be more devoted, more eager to provide feedback and can even become evangelists of new products or services.

So eventually, Likes can definitely have great value, but we need to gain a deeper understanding with regards to the way that customers engage in the social media with our brand, so as to devise the appropriate strategies, in order to maximise results.