Groucho Marx once said, “I don’t want to belong to any club that will accept me as a member.” Methinks if Groucho had been accepted to the Society of Good Taste, he’d have changed his tune.

You see, Grey Poupon has the distinction of being perhaps the only exclusive Facebook page in the history of social media marketing. While most brands are falling over themselves to get more Facebook likes, Grey Poupon is accepting new fans by application only.

Prospective fans must subject their Facebook feed to the scrutiny of Grey Poupon’s (virtual) judges, who dissect posts, photos and check-ins, then score the users from 1 to 100. Only those with high scores are allowed to “Like” the brand.

As comments from rejected fans show, this approach has bruised some egos:

Grey Poupon takes an apologetic approach in its replies, blaming faulty algorithms and inviting users to take the test again. But overall, the campaign seems to be a success.

“It is definitely counter-intuitive, but it came from a place of seeing a lot of very cliched brand pages on Facebook that all kind of look the same and are desperate for fans,” executive creative director at Crispin Porter Bogusky Tom Markham told Adverblog earlier this week. “We based our Facebook Page on quality over quantity.”

Quality vs. quantity: not a bad marketing strategy. What do YOU think — ridiculously exclusive, or just right? Let me know in the comments section, and don’t forget to share what’s been inspiring you this week!

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