It’s my personal belief that there are too many ‘likes’ in the world. One lot happens without people being aware whilst we strive for the other.
Both have a negative effect. Both applications make you look amateur and get in the way of your peers, bosses and customers taking you seriously.
The first kind of ‘like’:
“Like, I’ve been selling Bali for like, eight years now, but there’s like one spot I love, so when a customer asked me about it, I was like, “I can’t believe we’ve never covered this before!”
And the Social Media ‘like’.
It’s nice to like somebody’s photo. It’s nice to like a comment about your friend when they have got a new job. But is it nice to like a comment about your friend complaining about something?
Then became the seeking of like; like my business because the more likes I have the more successful I am and secondly, I’m going to post comments so I feel validated when you like them. I am not alone.
Martin Heppell from The Resilience Project told me kids are posting photographs at 9:45 PM and can’t sleep before they get 50 likes. Post a bad picture too late and they don’t sleep. That’s not helping with school. Meanwhile adults are getting wrapped up in first world problems and depend on their friends to gratify them.
Do ‘likes’ help your business? The research has mixed outcomes. At best its another brand impression or a way to notify your connections of events. But it does not necessarily mean they will use your service. Actually, given that I receive three ‘like’ requests a week, I’m not really interested anymore.
So are seeking online ‘likes’ a good thing for people or business? No.
Stop saying ‘like’
It apparently began with Valley girl or equally educational and worthwhile television show… go and hang out at a shopping mall and you will be fortunate to observe ‘likes’ in the wild sprouting from the mouths of teenagers. Before you say it, it’s an adults right to sprout the ilk of “Kids of today… when I was a boy/girl….”. But my parents didn’t encourage maximum words for minimum content either.
‘Like’ is the new ‘um’ or ‘ah’ or ‘yeah, nah’ – filler content, a pause to collect your next words. How about thinking before you speak? Who said you needed to talk the whole time ? You don’t learn whilst you are talking. There is nothing wrong with a considered pause .
‘Like’ is a nasty habit if you’re trying to sound professional, as well.
I’ve banned my daughter from saying it. She’s eight and she is already learning to think about what she says. Why can’t you? It sounds so amateur. It’s got to the point now I tune out by 20 percent because there’s a lot of filler. It is not trendy. It detracts from your conviction.
‘Like’ doesn’t do you any favours.
“I know, right… thank you so much”.
This video nails it beautifully