There are a couple of different ways in which Facebook users can stay connected with those that they know – or know of.
Adding someone as a Facebook friend is the standard way of connecting on the platform – but it’s not the only option available. Users can also choose to follow someone else and view content that they share publicly, without needing to wait for a friendship approval.
This can often mean that there will be users who follow you on Facebook without being your friend – making them privy to content you may not be aware of them seeing.
To add another layer of privacy to your content, you can either block all followers that you aren’t friends with already, or individual and manually block individual followers.
Here’s a quick guide on how to do both.
How to Block Followers Who Aren’t Facebook Friends
To ensure that only friends can follow your content and stay up to date with you feed, you need to make a couple of adjustments in your settings.
- Click on the menu button in the bottom right hand corner of your Facebook screen
- Select ‘Settings and Privacy’ then ‘Settings’
- Under the ‘Audience and Visibility’ heading, select ‘Followers and Public Content’
At the top of the page you will see an open labelled ‘Who Can Follow Me’. To limit your followers to friends only, make sure that ‘Friends’ are selected. If you want to make your content accessible to anyone who wishes to follow you, you should select ‘Public’ – or turn on Professional mode which adds extra business and creator layers and analytics data to your content.
How to Remove Individual Followers
If you feel uncomfortable about a specific follower, the best thing to do is to block them from your profile. To do this, you need to visit their profile page and manually block them – selecting the button with the three dots next to their profile name and clicking ‘Block’.
Not only does blocking prevent them from being able to search for and view your profile and updates, but it also means that you will no longer see anything related to them on Facebook.
You can reverse a block anytime within your account settings.
We hope this helps! Allowing public followers can sometimes be a good way to grow your profile and increase visibility of your content – however, it is not always something you want to make available to everyone. Using the above tips and processes will help to keep you safe from unwanted attention on Facebook.
