A week or so ago, several blogs called out the fact that fan counts and growth were being reported inaccurately by Facebook. Facebook corrected this, it seemed, as our fan count went from 69k to 74k overnight. However, something strange happened again last night. As I logged in to check our fan page late last night, I couldn’t help but notice to my horror that we were missing 5,000 fans. When I had left work, we were at a solid 75,000 and steadily heading towards 76,000. Upon log in last night, we were down to 70,000. Did I black out and post something horribly offensive? Had we somehow been linked to the Gulf disaster? Were we on the verge of a social media meltdown?

No. Closer inspection revealed another “fan box”, below the main one, called “People Who Work Here”, with a population of roughly 5,000. Totaling the two gave us a figure of roughly 75,000, explaining the missing fans. It also explains why for the past couple of weeks, our insights have shown only 69,000-70,000 whereas the page showed the full 75,000. Okay, sigh of relief.

I sighed too soon. Upon logging into Facebook at work this morning, I once again checked the fan count and noted it was still 70,000. Then, to my horror, I noticed the “People Who Work Here” box had disappeared. It appears Facebook may have severed the connection to our page of 5,000 employees. Losing 5,000 fans, especially since a few were very active brand advocates & ambassadors is a huge deal. Figuring that each Facebook user has an average of 65 friends, this is a loss of 325,000 potential connections.

I can only hope that this is another half baked feature Facebook rolled out, rescinded, and is now reverting. Fingers crossed.