How do you keep up with Facebook’s rules when they seem to change them more than you change your underwear!
A new feature in Facebook’s arsenal of making life hard, is their new ‘auto-reported by Facebook’ that is appearing in groups to the admins.
NOW, one would think ‘hey great! No more porn or inappropriate content’, well this is not the case!
We have been watching this occur in several groups that we are admins on, and while ‘some’ porn and other posts are being caught, so are very GENERAL images! We are seeing business posting images that are very G-rated with information that we can’t see should be reported for any reason. So, what is happening?
What does this mean to you? Let’s break this down and try to make some sense of it.
Group Admins will see that a post has been reported. It’s a lovely big RED notification – can’t be missed! Of course, they will click to see what’s happened. Now, there is options, they can post it to the group [sounds like a simple answer!] delete the image, or worse they can delete the image AND block you! Here is where the problem lies – IF they leave your post, you will always stay in the ‘red’ section even if it’s showing in the group. Now in all fairness – as a group admin – that is beyond annoying! Because every time an admin check the page, that big RED warning is there, so that means time and even having to scroll and sift to find any other posts that should be deleted. Allowing your post in the group will not remove it from this reported section, it will stay there too! Remember admins often have jobs or a business and this ‘time’ wasted is valuable to them. Bad Facebook! So, chances are, your post will be deleted so they have clean ‘housekeeping’ for the groups and time saving to manage. So please, if your post is deleted, be kind and know it may be ‘housekeeping’ and not done because it’s ‘report worthy’
Why is your post being marked for ‘auto-reporting by Facebook?’
This is the million dollar question! If you’re posting against Facebook Terms & Conditions [Yes you know there are rules!] then you should stop and follow their community guidelines. If your post is as mentioned, G-rated and to the best of your knowledge it’s inside the guidelines, then there are some things you can try.
- Rename your image. The name of your image you are uploading may the same as another user who has been posting porn and has been flagged to be caught by the system.
- Reconsider the wording in your post. Check your links – if someone has reported your links they may be flagged to draw attention to group admins to check. [Which would be fine if Facebook removed approved posts from the reported section!] You could also look at the words you are using and think if they may be something Facebook would flag to report to admins.
- Re-word your post. If you are copy and pasting the same thing into several groups, Facebook may be picking it up and flagging it for ‘possible’ spam.
- Emoticons – If you are using these to excess in your posts – try cutting down on a few and limit to just the important ones. Yes it makes your post eye catching, however if its flagged ‘auto-reporting’ and admin delete [see above] then your time and hard work has just been for nothing.
So how do you know if your posts are ‘auto-reported’ and deleted?
That we don’t have any answer to at this stage. But if you learn anything, or we do, we will most certainly update this blog!
If you feel your posts are not showing up, or have disappeared, then it might be worth sending a friendly message to a group admin and just ask. Chances are they will be happy to let you know if your post was auto-reported and if it was deleted to remove it from the RED section.
Facebook is changing the rules so often it’s hard to keep up; however the best you can do is keep tweaking to find what is right and wrong and make sure you play the game by their rules. Facebook jail may be crowded, but it is a very lonely place!