It’s Worth It To Like Our Facebook Page. Trust Us. We’ll Tell You Why Later.

In an earlier career incarnation, I was a fundraiser. In fact, I wrote new donor acquisition letters (“direct mail prospecting”) under the signatures of two Majority Leaders of Congress and a future Vice Presidential candidate.

About 15 years ago I attended a talk on direct mail fundraising, and remember the story of one of the most legendary and successful pieces of fundraising mail on either side of the aisle. It was written under the signature of then-North Carolina Senator Jesse Helms, and effectively just said something along the lines of:

I’m locked in an important battle with liberals and don’t have time to write more. I need your help right away, I’d appreciate if you could send a gift and will update you with news soon.

That was it.

One thing learned in direct mail fundraising, though, is that you can only do this once (to the same set of people). If you have a strong relationship, people will trust you, but you can erode that trust.

Chase has been marketing to its United co-brand cardmembers that they should ‘like’ a special Facebook page. In Facebook ads they’ve said to do it, and they’ll like what they get for doing so — without any specificity about what it is they’d get.

Last night I received an email asking me to do the same:

And all I could think about was that Jesse Helms fundraising appeal. Send money, or like our page, because it’s important — it’s going to matter to you — trust us and we’ll tell you why later.

Except when I see promises like that I inherently don’t believe them. If it was a good offer, they’d make it. If they already have your action, what reason is there to then invest in a good offer?

Besides, I’m even skeptical it makes sense to invest in the platform, let alone reward people for subscribing, as Facebook’s algorithm changes as to what to display in timelines reduce the value of commercial posts that aren’t paid advertising.

At least this time they were a bit clearer about what to expect, in the longer form of an email instead of a Facebook ad.

Just “like” us to receive posts that feature fun and useful information including:

• How to get the most value from your MileagePlus Card from Chase

• Airport info and travel tips, along with Cardmembers’ travel photos and comments

• Updates about Inside Access events, VIP lounges, and MileagePlus events and auctions

• MileagePlus program news: bonus-mile and partner offers, new ways to earn or use your miles

• Tips on planning your trip, booking tickets and checking in, plus information about new destinations and more

• Fun, rewarding giveaways and opportunities to earn even more miles

We look forward to welcoming you to the MileagePlus Cards by Chase Facebook community.

In other words… nothing useful, except perhaps the ‘opportunities to earn even more miles’ that are, once again, non-specific.


About Gary Leff

Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel - a topic he has covered since 2002. Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »

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Comments

  1. I am sick and tired of companies offering ‘special offers’ for connecting facebook to them. I always have, and continue to view Facebook as a way to connect to PEOPLE. Facebook was supposed to, and I hope still will, make it against their TOS to do things like this.

  2. I hate Liking thing on Facebook. If I were to like the page mentioned, it would mean that every time someone new Liked the page, I’d see it in my feed.
    I’d re-consider if they were to offer me 5000 miles. 😉

  3. This is why I have a bogus facebook account used only to take advantage of offers. I get very amused whenever I do log into it, since it’s basically a bunch of company robots talking to their imaginary friend.

  4. I too received that same Chase in my Inbox and didn’t take action. Why? Because I already get emails from Chase letting me know when they’re having Inside Access events or Mileage Plus events –like the VIP Lounge they had in NYC right before the Super Bowl– and that’s the way I like it. I prefer them to email me, and then it’s up to me to go to an event, or purchase a ticket or whatever. End result? I deleted the Chase message.

  5. Yeah… I liked an American item or two on Facebook because of the promise of miles to be awarded, but I don’t really like FB and I don’t like UA enough to broadcast to the world that I “like” United without some sort of actual reward.

  6. At the Radisson Americas conference yesterday, the technology manager stated the issue they have is so much data on customers and how to actually sift through the data and use it.

    Every Facebook like gives a company access to your data that eventually they will use to target customers for good benefits and possibly to weed out customers who are not revenue enhancers.

    And we worry about the NSA files.

  7. @Ric Garrido “And we worry about the NSA files.” See, it’s not just that someone has the data but what they can do with it. The worst thing that Radisson can do is decide they don’t want to reward you with bonus offers or elite status. The government can ship you off to Gitmo.

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