Whenever a friend of yours on Facebook wants to get your attention, it is very easy to do. He or she can tag you in a post by sharing the post and typing in your name in the text above. Whenever you are tagged in a post, it will show up on your wall. It is good to do when you are sharing a blog post that a friend of yours had written. For instance, if your friend, say his name is John Smith had written a wonderful blog post, you will share his post and write above “Great post from John Smith”, and your acknowledgement will end up on his Facebook wall because he was tagged.
Once in a great while, if you want to wish some of your friends a happy holiday or just to let them know you are thinking of them, it is okay to tag them. However the key phrase is once in a while. Never make this a habit because it will annoy them!
Unfortunately, a lot of people abuse the Facebook tagging feature because they believe it will help spike up their Klout scores. That only angers people on their list because all they will be finding is tagged content on their Facebook walls all of the time from the same people over and over again. This kind of behavior is called gaming.
So my advice to you is to only tag your friends if there is a good reason for it. There are 3 occasions when it is okay to tag.
1. Acknowledging the fact that your friend had shared something impressive. Like I said before, if your friend had written a great blog post, or shared something that you found appealing, it is okay to tag your friend in that case. He or she will appreciate it in that case.
2. Wishing your friends a good holiday. Some people may disagree with me on this however I find that for major holidays like the winter holidays or even Valentine’s Day, it is acceptable to tag your friends with content that is relevant to the holiday just to let them know you are thinking of them. However, do not tag them just to wish them a happy weekend or happy week. You can just send a post on your own wall if you want to wish your friends a good week or weekend. They will see it anyway in their feeds. Make the occasion special.
3. Sharing something that will catch your friends’ attention. If you find an article or image that would be of interest to some of your friends, it is okay to tag them with it- as long as you do not once again, make it a habit.
Tagging otherwise, is not acceptable!
Good post. I had never really thought of it because my close friends and I tag each other a lot or otherwise, we would miss the conversation. 🙂 Funny thing is I had no idea it affected any kind of scoring anywhere. LOL
Kathy
kathyhadleylifecoach.com
Thanks for commenting Kathy and indeed it does! Some people abuse the feature in order to game up high scores, however it does not work so much anymore because Klout is cracking down on this kind of activity which is good!
I did not know that about tagging. I tag pictures of friends fairly regularly as I am photographing them for an event or something similar through my photography business. I’d be interested in your feedback.
If your friends and family do not mind it, then it is okay. I am talking more along the lines of if you are building a network, many in your tribe will be irritated if they are tagged over and over again.
Very informative. Glad I stumbled in here! I rarely tag anything but I can now see how that may actually benefit some of my friends. Thanks for the great post!
Thanks for commenting!
Great post, Miriam!
Thanks!
I totally agree. I do not mind every once in a while, it is the ones that do it every day or over 2 times a week that gets old. I spend at least 5 minutes hiding tagged posts from my timelines each day. Thanks for writing this post and I have shared it across the board.
Thanks Heather
I agree Miriam, tag abuse seemed to fade for a while and now it seems to be coming right back. Someone posts a cute pic, adds a lame greeting on there and tags as many people as possible. I understand wanting it to go viral but it shouldn’t be at our friend’s expense. Tagging was originally meant to tag people that were actually in the photo. Now it’s more a pathetic plea for attention by the masses. Sorry, you might have touched a nerve there. lol
Yes Brian, lame reasons to tag. I agree.
Yes Yes Yes… So irritating when people tag every day with some picture I agree with Brian with some LAME things that says Good morning and tag a ton of people.
And there are people out there that will actuallly say all you have to do is tag 100 people day and that is how You will get You Klout score Up… Drives me nuts… Stop it LOL… Thanks for a great post…
Definitely not a way to build up Klout
I agree Miriam! Somehow I think that people overuse and abuse tagging (unfortunately). I believe in content so if something is simple/”silly” then just don’t tag people or just tag those who are your best-friends-forever and they agree to that 😉