The quick answer is no. You should try to get more engagement.

The long answer is more complicated.

First off, let me make a few disclaimers here. I’m not addressing the businesses that have five, 10 or 30 likes. If your business only has as many likes as you have employees, you need to boost your likes to at least a couple hundred. I’ll write about how to get those first initial likes in another post.

But let’s say you have 350 likes. You may think it’s most important for you to get 1,000 likes, and it does help build social trust for people who find you from their friends and family. But after your first hundred or thousand likes, you may be wondering if you should still be prioritizing growing the fans on your page.

Why does the number of likes matter?

Having a following on social media sites, including Facebook, indicates to your customers and people checking you out that you are well-liked, that people respect your business and approve it. Just like the numbers on a sales page (“6 million people have taken my course and changed their lives”), a high number of likes gives social proof and credence to your venture. The theory goes: The more fans, the better your business must be.

Then why not keep trying to grow your Facebook page and surpass POTUS and Rihanna? Why stop when you still haven’t reached 10,000 fans or 100,000 fans, or even 1,000 likes?

Because likes don’t mean people care.

I know, that sounds completely contrary to everything I’ve said so far. Hear me out.

Over the past few years, Facebook has dwindled the amount of posts from businesses in a person’s newsfeed to 1 to 2 percent. That’s because people have used Facebook less when they’ve seen more advertisements and posts from businesses than from their friends. And people have specifically said they want to see more of their friends’ posts, so Facebook is catering to the needs of the people to keep a strong and active community.

[bctt tweet=”Likes don’t mean people care” username=”rallioHQ”]

Facebook’s decision makes marketing more difficult for business owners and their Facebook brands. Whereas before, every post you created could come into a person’s Facebook newsfeed, nowadays only 2 to 3 percent of your audience will see a post from a business they follow.

So your fans may like your business as a whole (“Yeah, I like buying my groceries at Home & Heart Co.”), but that doesn’t mean they like what you have to share. And if they don’t like what you’re posting enough to engage and share it with their friends, then your very large page will be very, very quiet.

Now, here’s the catch.

You should still try to get more Facebook likes, but as a secondary goal. Your first goal should be engaging with your current fanbase.

At this point, you might have just enough likes in comparison to other local businesses and can start focusing on crafting engaging posts. But what if you have thousands of page likes with hardly a share on your posts?

First, review your content and make sure you’re not making any of these social media mistakes. Then, analyze your content for engagement and see what type of post gets the most engagement.

Start posting the most engaging content more frequently, and keep monitoring what gets the most shares. If you’re looking for ways to create more shareable content, check out these ways to get more shares on Facebook.

When you have a post that has outperformed all your other successful content, sponsor it on your Facebook page to your fans and their friends. This boost will act as the spark to generate more organic engagement on your page posts (but will only work if you’re posting similar content regularly.) Keep analyzing your content engagement to create more and more shareable Facebook posts.

Remember, the transition to having an engaged Facebook page doesn’t happen overnight. But here’s the funny thing: Having an engaged audience will bring more people to like your page anyway. So in a way, you’re growing your page likes without focusing on it.

Yet you’re not growing your likes for a number; you’re growing an engaged audience. And that, even if small, is much more important.

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How are you engaging your audience? And in what ways has building an excited fan base also grown your following? Let me know your strategies in the comments, or tweet us on Twitter.