Scientists' Views on the Value of Likes in Social Media: A Guide for Marketers and "Narcissists"

All social media users today can be categorized as marketers. They can portray themselves as tough fishermen or the world's best wives on Facebook or Instagram. On Facebook, users can advertise themselves as intellectuals who sing in the shower about the Heisenberg uncertainty principle.

Even for social media marketing (SMM) & video production services experts, likes are a mystery. Actually, we only know one thing about them: posts that are naturally liked (without using trickery) get more attention on social media. This is how intelligent newsfeed algorithms function.

Most people will find this information to be sufficient, but I was interested in the underlying mechanisms. Let's look deeper. We all work in the attention economy and want to be able to make more money with less effort.