I had heard there was a 5k friend limit on Facebook. I just didn't take it to heart. Until I reached 5k and tried to add 5001., at which point FB reminded of the limit.
It was a weird moment ,but actually one that I have come to respect and appreciate. Facebook went from being a way to broadcast information to 5k people, probably 4k of which I didn't know or even have a business link to, to a platform I either had to take seriously or walk away from.
I try to have open lines of communications with anyone who is interested in The Mavs, HDNet, HDNet Fights, 2929 Entertainment, Radical Buy or any of the many other businesses I'm associated with. If they had a question, I wanted to be able to at least acknowledge it, if not answer it. My email address, mark.cuban@dallasmavs.com is readily available across the net.
What I had not accounted for was that there were a lot of people who I had never met or had any connection to, who took the concept of FB "friending" literally. They wanted to interact as if we were long time friends. I was getting FB emails asking me how i was doing. What I was up to tonight. What did i think of X, Y, Z. Stuff that I was not going to tell a total stranger, even if they were my FB "friend"
So I started paring down "my friends". Based on where they lived, or what friends we did or didn't have in common, who they worked for and whether or not I thought there could be some, or any common ground. It was kind of a bizarre process of deciding who i didn't want as a :"friend". I actually felt bad "cutting" people from my friend list, but I really didn't have a choice.
i also had to make decisions on the 100 plus new friend requests I get per day. Could this person really be my friend ? Could this person really be someone i do business with ? Did I actually know this person ?
Its kind of a bizarre process of clicking on ignore and deleting friend requests. To any of you who I have deleted or ignored. Its nothing personal.
My new FB strategy is not exclusively about "friends" in the truest sense of the word. Its about three layers of "friends"
The first layer has my real friends. Those people who who I have actually met in real life and who I enjoy keeping in touch with. FB provides a great way to keep up with things with them via pictures, notifications, etc.
The 2nd layer is people who I have tangential connections to. They may just live in Dallas Fort Worth. They may be self proclaimed Mavs or MMA or movie fans, or in groups I'm in. For whatever reason there is something about them that I could connect to.
The 3rd layer is emerging as a very unique and interesting network in FB.
Its what I will call "The Power Layer." These are people who in whatever industry they are in , retain some level of power. Having them as FB friends, although very simple and non committal, gives me some level of access to them, and them to me. These are people that if they sent me a FB mail, i would certainly read and respond to , and I think they would do the same.
Its what I could also call the one shot layer. If you have an idea or thought, you get 1 shot, per year to get their attention. Anything more than that probably could and would get me deleted. Everyone at this layer gets pitched continuously. Myself included. If you abuse it, you lose it.
I honestly was shocked at how many people that I really respect in the business world are on FB. It will be interesting to see if big business networking flourishes on FB or if participation on FB is just a way for "the Power Layer" to get a better understanding of, and to keep track of what is happening in the FB universe
My New Facebook Strategy and the FB Power Level
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Reader Comments
(Page 2)22. Mark, this is a valuable suggestion-- something I tried to do even back when I organized my contacts in Excel. Beyond this I can think of a number of ways I like to group people (by industry, by the period of my life during which I met them, etc.) and I also like to associated notes or various text fields with each. With that in mind I created a Facebook app that acts like a spreadsheet where each row is one of your friends and you can define the columns. It becomes an easy way to track folks and filter them.
Try it out:
http://apps.facebook.com/rolodexterous/
25. As one of the people that was eliminated; I'm glad to know that it was nothing personal.
Posted at 3:06PM on Dec 19th 2007 by Joshua R Druce
26. Social networking and marketing will be somehow tied together in the future and so its important to be part of it.
I think there are new opportunties tied up in understanding all of this. The book the Tipping Point, even if written pre social networking, really gets to the core of all this.
That stated, I simply cannot friend someone I don't have a professional or personal tie to face to face. I'm 44 and I run a business and I guess that old value system will keep me out of this loop. But I'll try to keep one foot in!
Posted at 3:12PM on Dec 19th 2007 by john Palazzo
27. I like your explanation of FB levels. I'd be interested in hearing what percentage of friends you "added" vs. what percentage "added you" initially.
I highly recommend using the friend list capability, where you could break your list down by your levels or a combo of levels/industries.
Posted at 4:57PM on Dec 19th 2007 by Webconnoisseur
28. Wow - I had no idea that facebook had a limit - not that I have to worry (lol) none the less ever since reading "The Tipping Point" - it's interesting to note that whenever a group reaches @150 people it starts breaking into smaller manageable and meaninful groups. The Viral joining on social networks is interesting to watch and I'm actually questioning the true value. For me the larger it gets the less valuable it becomes (i.e. more expendable and like spam) - It's all so interesting to watch evolve - thanks for sharing your thought process.
Posted at 5:28PM on Dec 19th 2007 by Cyndee Haydon
29. Mark,
Have you checked LinkedIn.com? This has an good premise for creating business contacts, although it could be developed further, a la FB.
Posted at 6:22PM on Dec 19th 2007 by Jason
30. I was wondering about how you were managing your Facebook friends. I only caved and signed up for Facebook a month or so ago and when I saw your profile on it linked through a friend I was a little surprised. I was more shocked when a saw that you had thousands of friends. "Why," I thought to myself, "would Mark Cuban put all of these people in as friends on Facebook."
I realize there is the whole Jason Calacanis (and thus, now Leo Laporte) theory of "friending" people on Facebook, Twitter, Pownce, etc. but to make a social network like Facebook useful for anything other than marketing, limiting your friends seems the only way to go. Try following more then 300 people on Twitter and you'll see what I'm talking about.
Having said that, even when I saw you had over 4,000 friends, I almost added you as a friend. I'm a product manager for a digital cinema company and deal with Landmark Theatres. Thought it couldn't hurt to have access to the owner of the company, not to mention someone heavily invested in D-Cinema, if I was ever in need of some serious answers or research pertaining to the market.
http://twitter.com/sperling
Posted at 6:34PM on Dec 19th 2007 by J. Sperling Reich
31. Oh, guess what, it looks like Facebook released a new feature today that lets you sort your "friends" into different groups. Jacob nailed it in comment #6! No more talk; I'll have to set up my FB Power Layer list now. :)
Posted at 6:52PM on Dec 19th 2007 by Gene Shiau
32. #8 is right, you can make a celebrity account or some such. I've got Kevin Smith as a friend that way too. I'd be glad to add you as such a friend... but not as a normal friend since I've never met you. Though you are a dancing fiend and get bonus points for that. Please let us know if you make such an account.
33. Mr. Cuban,
An astute business man and visionary you obviously are, considering a number of your moves. I would very much like the opporutnity to present to you my company and overall vision of what I am creating.
If such an opportunity, to present this to you, exists how would I get my company portfolio and information to you and your team?
Gary Thomas - Owner & President
Posted at 10:59PM on Dec 19th 2007 by Gary Thomas
34. Mark,
FB isnt any different than Linkedin in that regard.
the whole point is to only connect with people you know. Im not a "celeb" like you, but I certainly get my share of additional "pings" on linkedin. That being said. I use linked in to kinda keep in touch on where everyone is.. I think when you get to people you didnt know anyway.. then its more of a "who really cares"... and the tool becomes less valuable..
All that being said. I did see "a popular actor" on linked in that I've always liked since childhood. and I did "ping" him. So im guilty of it a bit as well.
All the best.
Mike
Posted at 11:03PM on Dec 19th 2007 by Mike Verinder
35. I think this is a very interesting post - I've been trying for a while to wrap my head around this phenomenon. I have found that the different social networks offer this kind of level creation in some way. LinkedIn is the close business relationships, Friendster is (was?) for real friends, Facebook is for those Friendster folks plus people you might meet out and about and actually enjoy hanging out with, and MySpace is for everyone and anyone who you run into.
I have had some funny experiences on LinkedIn where some folks (in a generation a couple years ahead of mine) have turned down friend requests from me despite our having some marginal business interactions. This was the seed of my thought, but I think it would be very interesting to look at how this breaks down along age/business type/goal of the users.
Thanks for starting these discussions. Certainly interesting stuff.
36. You are not using Facebook as it is meant to be used.
Set up a Fan page where there is no arbitrary limit on the number of "fans" you can have.
Use your Facebook profile for *real* friends.
Posted at 12:46AM on Dec 20th 2007 by Jamie
37. I hate to say it, but using a social network as a tool to enhance your real life social network is the entire freaking point. I can't recommend Jaiku enough for that and have a hard time imagining why anyone in their right mind uses Twitter. I follow 30 friends on Twitter yet I have upwards of 200 following me and I'm just a lowly tech journalist. Pownce has similar ideas to Jaiku in terms of UI, but they added that layer of privacy so you can send messages to only friends. It isn't a perfect tool, then again nothing is. I just want facebook to die already, this coming from someone who has been using it since it launched back when it was the domain of college kids and only college kids.
Posted at 1:42AM on Dec 20th 2007 by Stefan Constantinescu
38. Overall I am impressed with Facebooks approach to provide an entry point for business to enter the social network space.
With the existing developer platform, which i'm finding as we integrate a number of our existing products to be the starting of a real avenue for businesses to interact with their market in a more interactive way than we've seen before. And i'm not talking wolf or vampire bites but real system integrations.
Combined with this their new pages initiative for business which while when using you can tell it's in it's infancy, will develop nicely.
Having 5k contacts makes for an intense viral experience when you can whip up a facebook business page in 20mins.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=6996230804
Posted at 1:53AM on Dec 20th 2007 by Scott MacKenzie
39. Mark—I found this post via Darren Rowse's post on Blog Friends.
I guess the trouble with the "friend" metaphor for social networking is that it implies a symmetrical relationship. At Blog Friends, by contrast, we don't force relationships into a symmetrical mold: we allow you to track blog posts from (a) your Favourites plus (b) your Favourites' Favourites—we call it your Respect Network.
The point here is that fan relationships tend to be one-way. So if you added Blog Friends to your facebook profile, you'd probably stack up three hundred odd fans like Darren has pretty quickly. : )
Posted at 3:07AM on Dec 20th 2007 by Luke Razzell
40. hey mark
ive got 3600 friends, yes lucky me. i was under the impression that i could just start a second account when i reach 5000 rather than making 'hard' choices.
david
Posted at 4:26AM on Dec 20th 2007 by david usher
21. Mark,
If you like organizing your friends then you'll love Friend Lists -
http://www.facebook.com/friends/
We launched this last night and it allows you to group your friends for easy status updates, messaging, etc.
You should also create a Facebook Page for yourself. This way you can still interact with fans while keeping your Facebook profile to your friends, family, and colleagues.
- Ben
Posted at 1:15PM on Dec 19th 2007 by Ben