Like a thief in the night

Do you ever have one of those days, or weeks, or months, where everything seems to not make sense and suddenly its an epiphany tsunami hitting you at all sorts of odd moments?

It could just be cortisol levels being through the roof as I implement changes and try to take our business to the next level, but a good sleep has been hard to come by, a quiet day is no longer in my vocabulary, and so it shouldn't be, because quiet days are not necessarily a blessing in FnB! :)

We avoid using the "Q" word, as we call it. As soon as we say, "Dang, its quiet" we get slammed. Every time! Its a good thing, sometimes a team member will purposely say it, just to bring the masses in.

Anyway, on to a more purposeful topic...

Well, I can't be the first, or the last person on earth who has wanted to free herself off the shackles of social media. For a few years now I have toyed with the idea of completely taking myself off Facebook, but it seemed like an alien idea because it seemed to be everyone with an internet connection had an opinion on how its so important for business, or for keeping in touch with family, or for peeking in on the lives of former schoolmates who no longer even look like people you remember.

First I couldn't delete it because I was too busy wanting to share everything I was doing, almost to the point that someone might want a refund on the time they wasted reading my post. Then I dialed it down, to sharing every burp and milestone of my kids after they were born, hell, most of my friends or family were introduced to my younger two within the first minutes after their birth, thanks to Facebook.

Then came my business ventures, what we call "Entrepreneurship", one thing or another, selling, buying, being contactable, being visible, having a "presence" on the internet that somehow made it all official.

If you think about it, in this day and age, being "present" on the internet has actually made many people "not present" in their lives. And I am not saying this while wildly pointing a finger outwards, I am looking within too.

It hasn't been until the most recent few days, when I started to notice what I could only term as a "cyberattack" of the stealth-mode kind...where suddenly, at odd times of the day, like 1:45am, some random fake someone on Facebook would be noted as saying "Doesn't recommend" our company, that I sat up and took notice. At first I thought, fair enough, I am sure he might not have had a good experience, maybe he popped by and we were closed for lunch break at 4pm, who knows. But then it was at 1:45am that the person posted, so I did some digging...and this person, upon searching for the name on every possible platform, for all intents and purposes, didn't exist.

This one single "Non-recommendation" dropped our beautiful star rating from 4.7 to 4.5, in just ONE single click.

I thought, ok, weird, no comment left, no nothing. I sent the person a private message to ask, well, so sorry you had a bad experience, could you care to elaborate and give feedback so we can make amends or at least work on it internally to fix the issue.

No response.

The next day, another one, and again, this time, no images, no details on their profile, not even a "date joined", nothing. Fake profile. Another non-recommendation, and now we moved down to 4.3 stars.

I clicked on it, I sent a message to "Facebook" (whatever the hell that means!) and the anxiety began to build. Within 10 mins of this incident, and me telling the team, wondering what on earth was going on, another ping came in, another "non-recommendation" and an instant drop to 4.2 stars.

Now, this ain't no Black Mirror episode, but it sure felt awful. We have worked hard to get to a place where people took time to recommend us, 5 stars, all that stuff, and here I was, sitting in front of a computer, staring at our numbers dropping, thanks to fake profiles simply hitting one button, with very little control or recourse over the whole thing. One of our team mates said all matter of fact, "Ah, yeah, its called Black Hat Tactics" well, let me tell you, its the first time I have heard of this...

But now that I know, I can't unknow it. To think that someone, anyone, a business or individual, would actually maliciously do something like this, for whatever gain, its kinda insane, if you ask me. Unnerving. Like someone sneaking into your house, while you sleep, and stealing your hard earned good will! Lol.

If you want to know more about that, look here and have a read:

https://www.powertobefound.com/black-hat-social-media-will-kill-business/

Anyway, you see? I really am not into this kind of thing. So after years of toying with the idea of dropping Facebook, and for all the years of technically not understanding SEO (Search Engine Optimization) despite taking a course on it when I had my last business...I am right back to this decision of taking my page, and my own profile, off Facebook.

Ok, its not entirely true though, I did take a course, I did understand that SEO basically doesn't actually have to do with you being the best, it has to do with you using key words, knowing how to trick the algorhithm
and somehow even if you are at the top of the list maybe you aren't really meant to be at the top of the list.

Either way, I remember learning that and being kind of outraged. It seemed like a lie, or wait, not seemed like, it was. It is.

People pay to be listed at the top!

Isn't that insane?

Its not real, none of it is.

When we opened our shop, we didn't spend a dime on advertising. We didn't pay for marketing consultants. We didn't hire a social media guru, and trust me, a lot of them came knocking on our door.

Money was tight, we didn't have any to burn, although technically, I think we burned a lot on stuff I now think may have been better utilized on more useful things like window cleaner fluid. And by that, I mean, we made posters saying "Confusion Plant Based Kitchen - coming soon" as if anyone actually knew who the hell we were, as a shop, as a concept or even as a brand! Well, you live and you learn! :)

I have always wanted us to grow "Organically" without slogans, without buzzwords, without flashing people, you know, that sort of thing. People know, you go plant-based because it has an impact on the environment, on your health, on your bank balance, and on your carbon footprint. At least, I assume people know, and if they don't, there are a lot of other businesses who can educate them on it, paying top dollar to do so, while we continue to do what we do.

It is, and always has been, about the food.

Its not about looking good or not looking bad, it still did not sit well with me that we had no recourse other than to contact some form of AI to fight an obvious attack by AI of another kind, and I ain't in any way suggesting I felt like Sarah Connor suiting up for battle against SkyNet...but maybe I got a bit creeped out and decided enough is enough, and I pulled the plug. And I would be lying if I said I hadn't already been thinking, actually, wishing, to pull the plug for a long time.

So we are no longer on Facebook.

I, as an individual, am no longer on Facebook. And it feels awesome.

Don't get me wrong, many of the photos of my kids, the videos of their first steps or their first words, are stored on Facebook. I mean, I don't have them anywhere else. So I hope my husband has some saved, because once your MacBook dies, you forget, once your iPhone gets traded in for another, you say, "Pshhh, clean it!"

Life was so much easier in Analog.

I know, I am showing my age.

I miss not being able to erase memories with a click.

I miss my old wind up and click Minolta camera that took the most awesome photos on film.

I miss sharing my music with a friend with a DiscMan that made each of us deaf in only one ear.

I miss caring about making it to the movie theater when a new movie was released.

I miss skating rinks and skinny dipping in closed swimming pools.

Ok, so there are a lot of things I do miss, but I already experienced all those things...but Facebook, I won't miss. For people who cared enough to know me as a friend, they likely already have my number. But for everyone else, its pretty likely they were touristing on my life, or I was touristing on theirs, Facebook is the perfect Voyeurs window to the world.

Oh sure, I have Instagram, but even there, my own personal profile, I deleted and pared down to almost nothing a few months back. It took me an entire month to painstakingly delete, one image at a time, almost 1800+ images I had amassed over a few years. They don't make it easy, let me tell you.

And the company Instagram will remain, because I love photography. And just as with Facebook and this website, I am the one who created the content, I man that like a loner in a lighthouse, and I will do my best not to fall asleep at the wheel.

Only a few interests have stuck with me through the years. My love of writing, my love of photography and my love of food.

These are the passions I hope to hold on to, to nurture, to give room to grow, in the coming year.

I hope to take you with me on that journey. And hey, now that I don't have time to kill on Facebook anymore, maybe I actually will be more productive in all those areas while possibly getting a solid nights sleep from time to time!

Until the next time, peace!