Social media can be a bit tricky sometimes.  Sometimes you think you are doing the right thing and then BAM! something happens that throws you right off track.  A lot of you are aware that my Facebook account was hacked into and nasty SPAM created false ads on my Facebook page and debited my PayPal account $506.91. Well I can gladly say that I got my money back and Facebook even rang me in the end.  So the outcome was good but some lessons learned with social media certainly were had and I want to share them with you today.

1.  If you are a small business and you have boosted posts in Facebook like I did, or even created some advertising so your business can be seen, then listen up.  This is what I did and I paid to boost my posts with Paypal.  Little did I know that this ( being the Paypal) stays in Facebook.  It was how I got hacked into.  What you need to do is unlink the occurring payments from Facebook in your Paypal account.  That way it will all be unlinked.  Don’t let Facebook control your billing.

Here is the nasty spam that got into my account.  Be aware of bumpbe.does.it website clicks.

2. Paypal did not recognise my situation as SPAM.  As I had already had payments from Facebook Ad’s debited from PayPal account they simply closed my case after 1 day.  My PayPal account was in debit over $500.00 and if I did not resolve this within 90 days my account would seize.  So Paypal will not always  back you up.  The bank was able to stop any payments from PayPal debiting from my account but the bank told me that it was an issue with PayPal and not them.

3.  Social Media can be a very powerful tool for reaching out to people.  I told over 18,200 people on Instagram my story to warn everyone of the dangers of boosting posts on Facebook.  Everyone was so supportive, so thank you.

4.  Always be nice on Social Media.  It can be difficult when there are a few trolls out there.  I had one person the other day tell me off because I did not post the recipe for the particular picture of food I had posted.  It’s hard to please everyone and sometimes those people are better left alone.

5.  Trust your instincts and if something isn’t right then it probably isn’t.  I get so many emails from people pretending to be content writers or selling some products.  I junk their emails very quickly.

6. If you run a blog on WordPress then make sure you have widget to remove spam comments.  In just over a year I have had over 26,000 spam comments that have all been rejected.  It’s best to check with your website developer on which widget is the best for your platform but I use Akismet and it’s been fantastic.

Lastly, I just wanted to say how grateful I am for all your comments of support with my drama.  In the scheme of things it wasn’t really that important, especially compared to what’s going on in the world but lots of you sent so many encouraging messages that go me through.

Nothing a good run with guy (my dog) would’t fix. Oh and fresh flowers from hubby too xo.

Happy weekend everyone!