Day 1: Do you FLUNK at Facebook-ing? "Application Spamming" = Cr-App

This is just one is a series of 'Do you FLUNK at Facebook-ing?"  Do you abuse your Facebook friends?  Do you know how to turn off the 'auto wall posting' settings for your applications?  Read on...

Facebook is an amazing place, a social networking platform that connects long lost friends, high school senior classes, past room mates, people you worked with, family members and beyond.

But Facebook is also a great tool for the online business builder, if and only IF it is used properly.   Unfortunately Facebook has been found by spammers of all sorts.  Some of them have no idea they are even spamming.

This threee day Series of "Do you FLUNK at Facebook-ing?" will offer you some tips on utilizing Facebook the best way to grow your online business.

Now lets start with Applications (aka apps)

I can promise you that if you are filling people's walls with ihearts, kitten smiles and pillow smacks, you are going to lose a few friends.... You see, these are 'cute' when you are connected with a group of 25 people you knew from high school.   Maybe you send 'drinks' to the gals from the office....  Maybe you share angel blessings with your church group.

But if you are here for business reasons, you need to consider a few things...You see, some apps are manual, you have a choice to go in and send Mary a Mai Tai or Bruce a Beer. Those are great as you are selecting each person manually who gets what on a very personal level.

But some apps have a mind of their own and every time you make a kill on Vampire Wars or complete a batch of Buffalo Wings on Cafe World it is broadcast to EVERYONE'S wall on you friend list.  Again, perhaps not bad if you are soley socializing with a group of bunco buddies, but if you are Networking and have a friends list in the hundreds or thousands you could be broadcasting your activity to hundreds of thousands of persons.

Now pay attention to this statement "you could be broadcasting your activity to hundreds of thousands of persons."

Some may think "OH COOL", let me enlighten you.  "This is NOT a good thing if you SPAMMING while attempting to  GROW A BUSINESS ONLINE".

The last thing you want is for an industry great to click 'remove' and wipe you off of his stream, or even worse, delete you as a friend all together.   Your first thought may be "who cares", but let me reiterate.... "you could be broadcasting your activity to hundreds of thousands of persons...."  I will dive deeper into this over the next couple days...  Now you may wonder "WHY would they waste time deleting ME?"  Let me explain....

I am friends with many "big names" in the industry who have maxed out their friend balances (you may have only 5,000 Facebook Friends on your profile) and I am lucky enough to be one of those 5,000.  

Now consider this, what if just 1% of those people had apps on auto pilot?   That is only 50 people, assuming *only* 1% did not change their auto app settings, for just ONE app, that would be 50 automated 'spam' posts per day.   Now what if someone had 5 auto apps, what if 100 people had 5 auto apps?  All of a sudden you are part of a BIG problem clogging up someone's wall with cr-app!

Now your key as a web marketer is to be seen in a positive way, being Mary Mafia or Freddie Farmer in a very public way will certainly lessen your credibility in the Facebook circle, especially if you are making requests for AK-47s and Peach Trees....  So this is what you want to do.  TURN OFF THE AUTO WALL POSTING!

Here's how to edit Facebook App Settings...

Click on the 'Account' tab and a drop down box will fall, then click on 'Application Settings'.  You will see a list of your Applications.  Odds are there will be more here than you even knew about.  Often people join apps on 'accident' and even some of these 'accidental apps' could be spamming your friends' walls.

So first step, delete any app that you do NOT USE.   To delete the app, click the little X to the far right on each line.  Personally I only have 3 Apps, that's it!    Now to edit settings on the apps you use, you'll see next to the app 'edit settings'.  Now go in and click the 'Additional Permissions' and REMOVE the check where it says 'publish recent activity to my wall'. 

Now you also need to utilize the drop down box to the upper right, here you'll see 'recently used' followed by a series of other options, go to every single one on that list and DELETE and EDIT to clean up your applications lists!

Another note, some Apps attempt to bypass their setting by offering you a 'one time' post while in the game, click CANCEL when this happens. i.e you level up in Cafe World and the app asks you 'would you like to share this news with your friends?'  Click CANCEL or else you are SPAMMING!

You are on your way, great work getting rid of the cr-app!  Tomorrow we'll talk about Private Messages and Chats and what NOT to do!

Alethea Anderson
Anti Cr-app