The Right Way to Tag a Post on Facebook

To tag a post on Facebook is a tricky thing. When Facebook first unveiled the ability to tag a post, there was a lot of abuse. People used it as a mechanism to simply fling spam at their “friends” walls. While I don’t see much of that anymore, it’s still a strategy you need to use with care.

Imagine that you got to your office cubicle – or the front door of your house – and as you walked up you saw that someone had tacked a piece of paper to it. When you looked, you saw that it was a Xerox of a photograph with a note written across the bottom. Wouldn’t your initial reaction be negative, something like fear or annoyance?

Because your post shows up on the other person’s wall when you tag them, it’s a lot like what I just described – hanging a piece of paper on their door. And it causes a similar reaction in a lot of people.

In order to shift the reaction from negative to positive, you’ve got to make sure that your message is one they’re really going to enjoy, and be happy to leave there. A great question to ask yourself is, “Am I writing this primarily for my own benefit, or for theirs?” If you can’t say that it’s a bigger benefit to them than to you, then you probably shouldn’t write it.