Are you an influencer or an individual on Facebook and you want to add the follow button?
Or maybe you want to remove the “Add friend” button because you don’t want people to add you as a friend.
Many people have trouble with adding a follow button because it’s not enabled by default.
To enable it, you need to change a couple of your privacy settings.
Otherwise, the follow button will not show up on your profile.
Basically, the follow button allows the public to follow you.
When someone follows you, your public posts will be shown in your news feed.
In this guide, you’ll learn how to add a follow button on your Facebook profile.
How to add a follow button on Facebook
To add a follow button on Facebook, you need to set the “Who can send you friend requests?” privacy setting to “Friends of friends”.
You also need to set the “Who Can Follow Me” privacy setting to public.
After you’ve changed both of the privacy settings, your Facebook profile will have a follow button.
When someone selects the follow button, they will be able to see your public posts on your news feed.
However, you need to be 18 and above to have the follow button.
If you’re below the age of 18, make sure to change your age on Facebook to 18 or above.
Otherwise, you won’t have access to the follow button on Facebook.
To change your age on Facebook, navigate to your profile > About > Contact and Basic Info > Birth Date > Edit.
Here are 3 steps to add a follow button to your Facebook profile:
- Step 1: Set “Who can send you friend requests?” to “Friends of friends”
- Step 2: Set “Who Can Follow Me” to “Public”
- Step 3: View your profile as a visitor
Step 1: Set “Who can send you friend requests?” to “Friends of friends”
To begin with, open Facebook on your mobile device.
You can also use Facebook on a desktop, but the screenshots in this guide are taken from the mobile app of Facebook.
Hence, the user interface will be different.
Once you’re on Facebook, tap on the menu icon on the bottom navigation bar.
Scroll down the menu until you find the “Settings & Privacy” tab.
Tap on the “Settings & Privacy” tab to expand it.
Once the tab is expanded, you’ll see multiple options including “Settings”, “Privacy shortcuts”, “Your time on Facebook”, and more.
Tap on “Settings” to open the settings page.
After you’ve tapped on “Settings”, you’ll land on the settings page.
On the settings page, you’ll see multiple headers including “Account Settings”, “Security”, “Privacy”, and more.
Scroll down the page until you find the “Privacy” header.
Under the “Privacy” header, tap on “Privacy settings” to go to your privacy settings.
On the privacy settings page, you’ll be able to edit your privacy settings such as who can send you friend requests, who can see your friends list, and so on.
On the privacy settings page, you’ll see three headers including “Privacy shortcuts”, “Your activity”, and “How people can find and contact you”.
Scroll down the page until you reach the “How people can find and contact you” header.
The “How people can find and contact you” header is located at the bottom of the page.
Once you’ve found the header, tap on the privacy setting that says, “Who can send you friend requests?”.
There are two options for the “Who can send you friend requests?” privacy setting including “Everyone” and “Friends of friends”.
“Everyone” means that everyone will be able to send you a friend request on Facebook.
“Friends of friends” means that only the friends of your friends can send you a friend request on Facebook.
By default, the “Who can send you friend requests?” privacy setting is set to “Everyone”.
For the follow button to show up on your profile, you need to change the “Who can send you friend requests?” privacy setting from “Everyone” to “Friends of friends”.
Select the “Friends of friends” option and tap on the back icon to go back.
Step 2: Set “Who Can Follow Me” to “Public”
The next privacy setting that you want to change is the “Who Can Follow Me” setting.
The “Who Can Follow Me” setting is located in “Public posts”.
Under the Privacy header, tap on “Public posts”.
The “Public posts” page is where you can control who can follow you and comment on your public posts.
Once you’re on the “Public posts” page, you’ll see a “Who Can Follow Me” privacy setting.
This setting allows you to control who can follow you on Facebook.
There are two options for the “Who Can Follow Me” privacy setting including “Public” and “Friends”.
By default, “Who Can Follow Me” is set to “Friends”.
To allow others to follow you, you need to change the setting from “Friends” to “Public”.
Select the “Public” option to allow everyone to follow you on Facebook.
This will allow others to follow your public posts (similar to the “Follow” button on Instagram).
Step 3: View your profile as a visitor
The final step is to check if there’s a follow button on your Facebook profile.
Now that you’ve changed your privacy settings, your profile should have the “Follow button”.
To check it, navigate to your Facebook profile by tapping on the profile icon on the bottom navigation bar.
Once you’re on your profile, tap on the three dots next to the “Add Story” button.
After you’ve tapped on the three dots, you’ll land on the profile settings page.
On the profile settings page, you’ll see multiple options including “Edit Profile”, “Account Status”, “Archive”, and more.
Under the “Archive” option, you’ll see an option that says “View as”.
Tap on the “View as” option to view your Facebook profile as a visitor.
After you’ve tapped on “View as”, you’ll view your Facebook profile as a visitor.
This time, instead of having the “Add friend” button, you’ll see a “Follow” button.
Everyone that views your profile will now be able to follow you on Facebook by tapping on the “Follow” button.
Congrats, you’ve successfully learned how to add a “Follow” button on Facebook!
Conclusion
Allowing people to follow you on Facebook is important, especially if you’re an influencer.
This will allow your posts to be seen by other people.
If you don’t add the “Follow” button on your profile, people who are not your friends on Facebook will not be able to see your public posts on their news feed.
Adding the “Follow” button will allow others to see your posts on their news feeds.
This will increase your public posts’ reach, views, and engagement.
Further Reading
How to Disable Likes And Comments on Your Facebook Profile Picture
