It’s funny because we think when we click a simple button to connect something, we are used to things just working. When it’s pitched that it’s so easy to do e-commerce and such, we imagine blissfully selling products in our sleep.
If only it were that easy.
Funny thing is that we hear in the news that there’s all this fake news we can’t seem to control on social media. So it’s an amazing contrast that Facebook makes the time to approve not just an online store, but painstakingly and tediously approves or rejects EVERY single product of the online store item by item.
However, run into a glitch with the approval of a shop or a product? You can’t talk to a human at Facebook. I personally wish there was a way to even pay to talk to a human instead of their platform being run off other financial incentives, like our personal data or simply advertising. They’re just too big and there’s not enough manpower for all the people that want to do business on these social media behemoths.
I was told by Shopify today that he’s had his own personal issues with Facebook. And one of ten times he tried on his personal time, he was able to try to chat online/text with a Facebook person if he got lucky for his personal e-commerce reasons.
For whatever reason, no matter how big Shopify is, they don’t seem to be able to pick up the phone and talk to Facebook either.
Another rep told me: “I have seen multiple instances that are all so different (regarding issues with Facebook and Instagram connectivity and approvals) and hopefully with time we will have more information on our end for what their needs are on their end.”
It is like the Wild West of e-commerce when it comes to connecting Shopify, Facebook, and Instagram. You have to have extreme patience and it leaves some of my entrepreneurial friends “aghast” as it’s pitched as being so easy to do online business.
Really if there’s a glitch, you’re just directed to the policy pages by Facebook and Instagram which if you’re worth your salt, you already read before you tried to connect them. I know I felt like I was walking on eggshells to try to do everything right.
Sometimes, as I say, Shopify reps have their own side business and even they are not immune to the pitfalls of trying to work with Instagram and Facebook, telling me: “I can completely understand the frustration that you were feeling, I went through the same thing with my personal online store.”
For what it’s worth in that case, the rep said, ” I was quite upset. I did write to Instagram on the “Report a problem” section of the app. Then I removed and re-added it and was approved 24 hours later.
We definitely work hard to offer support for any social media integrations, and we are knowledgable on Shopify’s end of the integration, though we are not experts in each of the social media platforms, which is why we always do suggest to reach out to them directly.”
I was also told: “I do understand that it can be very difficult to reach these platforms. Therefore we do our best to help, based on what we can see, though we do see a mix of how Instagram approves shops and it is on a very case to case basis. So there is no way for us to give you exact information.”
When I was not approved, I was told by Shopify: “Unfortunately there is no way we can see for sure on this end or any way to appeal the decision on our end.”
So basically a lot seems to be luck of the draw. There are innumerable ways it seems to screw things up. And I seem to have found plenty of them. Lol.
But they’re honest mistakes and some are completely out of my control because they’re back end issues with Shopify.
I really don’t know if I’ll ever have smooth sailing because I keep running into so many sad stories of multiple people left scratching their head as to what is wrong and being left with crickets for answers.
Technology is great when it works. When it doesn’t forget it.
I mean if you go to a store half the time if there is any wifi interruption, they can’t even sell you what you’re there to buy even if you have cash in hand. Nobody has backup manual old-time registers.
We are at the mercy of computers. I don’t know if this is an improvement sometimes because we are so reliant on tech that the whole world grinds to a halt and it’s major news if cloud services are down or the like. Certainly it’s saved us incomprehensible man hours of work to do everything with tech but sometimes, wouldn’t it be nice to just hear a bell of an old fashioned cash register and sit down with a nice cold glass of lemonade in front of a cafe? Just sayin’.
I don’t make the rules in the world. I just live by them.
