Over the years I have done a little bit of advertising on Facebook for my art as well as my life coaching business. Overall there have been likes, follows on my page and some nice comments. But once in a while I get a message or a comment from someone to stop spamming their page. This has gotten me thinking, what is spamming?

As a small business owner with a desire to reach a broader audience, I advertise periodically. The purpose being to find people interested in what I have to offer and/or to sell my art. Advertising has been around since time began, but has evolved in the way we do it over the years. From hanging your shingle out on the walkway to newspaper ads, to television ads when that became possible, and now internet ads. Businesses have always had to find a way to let people know they are there, what they offer, and bring people into their stores so that they could make a sale and a living.

Although I find some advertisements annoying and sometimes offensive, I understand the premise behind it. With the current technologies and the way people advertise, if I don’t like a particular product or it’s not something I need, I just keep scrolling or skip it if that’s an option. If I feel like it’s absolutely inappropriate, I will report it if that’s an option.

But advertising isn’t spamming. At least not by my way of thinking, and I’d love to hear your thoughts as well. My definition of spamming would be when someone targets me specifically for a service, a product, or malicious intent. Spamming would be the businesses that email me directly with unsolicited “help” for my website, my Etsy shop, my YouTube channel. It would be the never ending messages on Facebook messenger that something on my page is against the rules or that some piece of information is copyrighted and I’ll be shut down if I don’t click on their link to get it fixed within 24 hours.

I don’t know anyone who likes to watch advertisements, except maybe during the Super Bowl. But I don’t know of any other way to help make people aware of products available. I’d love to hear your thoughts about how you define advertising verses spamming. I’d also love to hear other ways to get products and services out to people besides advertising.