FB page invite block

You’ve created a great Facebook page and you’re cranking out effective posts. People are engaging. So you invite them to like your page. But as you invite more people to like your page, Facebook blocks you from inviting because they think you are spamming. Have you had this FB page invite block happen to you? I did, and it’s maddening. But I have learned a lot surrounding the issue, and a few solutions along the way as well. Let’s dig in.

How does the FB page invite block even happen?

Great question. First a little background. I always had very few ‘likes’ on my Facebook page until a few months ago when I started getting serious about building my brand. Since then, I have been posting engaging content, trying various methods and working to build interactions. It started working. People like when you post good stuff and they’ll talk about it. The issue comes into play when you need to invite people interacting with your posts – and you do it too quickly.

This is the warning you’ll receive (on desktop/laptop):

FB page invite block scenario

I’ll give you my recent scenario. I posted some images of a big story happening in our area that got amazing traction. It was shared thousands of times and collected nearly 10,000 interactions. This was one of my biggest, if not the biggest posts since I started caring about building my page a few months ago.

When you click on the interactions and see who has liked the post (or loved, disliked, etc.), there will be an Invite button next to the name. These people do NOT like or follow your page, but they interacted with your post.

There’s the opportunity

This is an opportunity. Clicking the invite button sends that user a notification asking if they want to like your page. The conversion rate can obviously vary. But on the first day of this viral post I had, I was able to invite up to 500 people and I think added about 680 to my list for the day. That was huge.

However, as I was rapid-fire inviting people, suddenly the invite buttons wouldn’t depress and I couldn’t invite (this happened on mobile). I went to my laptop. Instead of getting the un-pressable invite button, something more sinister. It was an actual message saying what I was in violation of. My FB page invite block woes had begun.

Research conducted on this FB page invite block

I went to work trying to figure out what the hell was wrong. Keep in mind, these were active and engaged users. If commented and invited them, there’s a good chance I would see conversions to build my page. I had done nothing wrong – I had produced a great post, it went viral and now I was inviting those interested. This was not promoted, paid for or anything else. It was simple Facebook strategy. But Facebook had blocked me with the FB page invite block.

What I learned with the FB page invite block

Here are a few nuggets from my investigation into this ridiculous FB page invite block that I have been experiencing now for the better part of three days.

How many FB page invites can I send per day?

Immediately after diving into forum posts, I learned quite definitively that you can only invite 500 people to your page daily. That is my assumption based on what I’ve researched. But it’s a good rule for thumb for this exercise.

How long is the FB page invite block effective?

This is a great question. It ranges. I’ve read anywhere from a day to 30 days. Yes, 30 days, but I did not experience that and can only assume it’s for the worst violators. You an expect 1-2 days from my experience. As I’m writing this, I’m in day 3 after what I believe was two violations. So I will update this.

Can you email or call Facebook?

Not really, but when you do get the message that I received, it says you can let them know if it’s an error. Do that. I’m not sure it’ll do any good. But I’ve sent about a dozen messages to them. Do this as well… Click on the question mark logo in the top right of your browser on desktop and then New Support Message. That will take you to your Support Inbox. I sent two report requests as well. It’s been two days without answers.

As for calling, there is a number. Don’t bother. It does nothing valuable.

How do you NOT get blocked?

The million dollar question. The biggest thing I learned from the exercise is that it comes down to how fast you click the invites.

Here are a few strategies so you don’t fall victim to the FB page like block:

1. Don’t click the invite button too fast. I would recommend 2-5 seconds in between clicks. Facebooks algorithm can sense when you’re clicking too fast (they even say it in the warning message) and they think you’re a bot. So they ban you. When I first was banned, I was clicking as fast as I could.
2. Don’t go over 490 invites per day. At least that is what I’m testing right now.
3. You can use some extensions out there that are fantastic that can do the inviting for you with timeouts in between and counters so it takes all the guesswork out of it. Contact me if you want to know the one I use.
4. Start with the newest posts of invites first. This is more of a strategy move. If you have a ton of invites on a post from days ago, the newer posts are users that are fresh and most recently active. Your chances of converting with them are far better than with the aged post.
5. Bonus tip: This is a game-changer. By what I experienced, this FB page like ban only affects the user, not the account. So if you have more than one admin on each account, you have freedom. I am banned, but another admin account on my page is not – so I can continue to invite even though my direct Facebook user account has been temporarily banned.

Summary

I just came off a block and manually invited 30 people from one of my posts. Then I downloaded a free script that allowed me to invite 450 more with a 1.8 second timeout in between. Tomorrow I’ll do that again, hopefully on both admins and in a few days I should have invited everyone. My total page likes should be far higher than I could have ever imagined.

That is until the next big viral post!

Let me know your experiences, questions and comments below. Together we can help each other out and build our brands the right way without falling victim to things like the dreaded FB page like block. So long.

And since we’re on topic, drop me a like and say hi. Let me know how this strategy is working for you.