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The new Facebook algorithm and what it means to business owners
To fully understand the futility of the drama let’s start first with a back to basics concept of ‘communicating with your tribe’.
It should have and should always be about relevant and meaningful conversations full stop, regardless of your chosen medium or platform. In fact let’s say that is the biggest full stop in the world ever and anything else is pointless.
If you are in business, and my definition of this is that you are carrying out daily activities that generate an income, and to do this you need to communicate with other people or businesses you by default have no higher single objective than to say who you are, what you do and why should they pick you.
At the same time we can also say that being ‘in business’ is a long term plan. Chances of taking an idea from concept to fruition as an overnight success without needing to speak/write/portray any detail of said business is well … not highly likely.
Getting back to Facebook and how our nature and assumptions of communicating have wandered off the path…[bctt tweet=”By default you have no higher single objective than to say who you are, what you do and why should they pick you #FacebookWarrior” username=”fionacatchpowle”]
The tool gives us access to hundreds of potential customers. We know this as a fact based on the information there are over 2.1 billion monthly active users of people who need stuff.
If we are selling the right stuff for them and we can get that info in front of them there is a possibility they could buy from us. Kind of like doing 2.1 billion leaflet drop … maybe not such a good plan after all.
Facebook has been a way of communicating with people and then evolved into the realm of business, which seemed cool on face value. It was never created in the first place to be a mass-media dumping ground (like the aforementioned leaflet) but the not so smart marketer decided to make it all about that, and quite frankly spoilt it for the rest of us.
To combat zillions of pieces of information being posted, Facebook had to define ways to make it possible to be selective about what you saw in your news feed, as there simply is not enough time in the day to see it all and is it really news worthy? (the clue is in the title in case you have wondered – the news feed should be a feed of newsworthy items).
But the tiny error they made was to decide for us. They couldn’t really help that because it just has to be like that in order to evolve. However they could have probably helped deliver that AI (artificial intelligence) concept a little more openly in the first place. Enter stage right Edge Rank aka The Algorithm.
What happened next was a bit strange in my view. Rather than focus on what you were saying and how to present it, engage with users a build a tribe of like-minded people who would become your customers, we ended up with many a peculiar ‘guru’ creating a concept that we to join in a competition to ‘Beat the Algorithm’ – this has and continues to cause a lot of unnecessary confusion and mis-information among marketers.
Please get over it. You cannot beat the algorithm in any of its guises but you can train yourself to work in beautiful harmony with the algorithm.
[bctt tweet=”It’s not rocket science, the news feed should be a feed of newsworthy items #FacebookWarrior” username=”fionacatchpowle”]
The algorithm in any shape or form is, and always will be there, to enhance the user experience and make it meaningful and relevant. Concentrate on this when you create, post and engage with others and you will find as a business the experience will become more enjoyable for you as well.
The concept of ‘trying’ to use Facebook seems exhausting to me. Business owners need to take a step back, think about how they are acting and learn some of the basic Facebook Mechanics to relieve the stress and time consuming behaviour they are currently attempting.
Industry stats from Locowise in September 2017 using a study of 5000 pages shows average organic reach of a page post as 7.98%
Now, I have no idea what these people are posting but I can tell you hand on heart that no Page I operate or use as a test case has such low reach. Bearing in mind we use post reach followed by engagement as our primary stats to establish if what we are writing is for the right people at the right time, I personally would be gutted if my reach was that low every day.
So I can understand why people may be frustrated, but the long term view I have always adopted is to share information that people want to know. No posting for the sake of it, not gate-liking, no competitions, no baiting. Quite simply my method is about communicating with others as I would like to be communicated with.
My other golden nugget strategy is to think Local not Global. Yes you may have access to potentially thousands of people, but let’s be realistic. If you are a local business your customers will be local. Unless you have every online bell and whistle in place to capture a worldwide audience then you are not going to see results.
You can study ranking and signals until you are old and grey but nothing will replace being human.
The 3 main interactive actions are Comments, Sharing and Reacting (no longer classed as a post like as you have a choice of reactions). Those steps need a human to choose. Their choice will come about by the emotion the post evokes. Be real, be there and be yourself.
I have some online training coming up soon that will show you my Facebook Framework which is a set of repeatable simple steps that make sense. Super easy stress-busters that are effective.
Facebook Mechanics are the buttons to press at the right time. It still dumbfounds me as to why people try to over-complicate the process when there are some straightforward bells and whistles that Facebook have had in place for a long time which are very underutilized.
Stay tuned for more revelations. In the meantime please get in contact if you’d like to work with me on a one to one basis. I’m not everyone’s cup of tea so we need to know we are a good fit by having a video call first.
[bctt tweet=”You can study ranking and signals until you are old and grey but nothing will replace being human #FacebookWarrior” username=”fionacatchpowle”]
Blog
The value of a Page Like (previously known as Fan) has changed in significance dramatically in the last 4 years, when the dreaded Facebook algorithm was born.
The impact of a Page Like on your over-all popularity has lost it’s importance in the big scale of things in favour of percentage page/post reach .
It used to be the case with a Page Like that it meant your fans saw your posts – your valuable, highly crafted, audience targeted content. But that is not the case anymore and hasn’t been for some time.
(They say that ‘organic reach is down’ – but that’s a whole different story and I can prove that using carefully crafted content high reach is doable)
In fact a post like has more long term value to influencing the ‘know, like and trust factor’ of your target audience than a Page Like.
The significance of a Facebook Page Like has gradually faded to the lower levels of awareness right in front of your eyes, but in such a way you probably hadn’t even noticed.
Remember the big Page thumbs-up icon back in the day? Where is it now? Without actually looking do you know where the ‘like’ button is?
Do you know you can Unfollow a Page’s content directly from the news feed?
About a year ago the Increase Page Likes option was even removed from the advert manager option on the front objective page and now comes under engagement.
Last week Facebook started the migration of Likes to Community and now only show total likes as opposed to new likes.
Of course a Page Like has a value, but not the same type of value it did a few years ago.
A Page Like is no-longer the social currency it once was and those that have focused on it for so long, and now can’t help themselves, are the ones who are suffering the most. The old-school method of asking for Page Likes is so 2010.
Unless people are really interested in what you have to tell them they will not see your posts anyway.
There is now more ‘information’ in the news feed than ever before, but our ability to consume it has not changed. There are limits to how much you can see in one day, and Facebook now makes the decisions for you as to what you would prefer to see or not see.
The Facebook Page Like popularity contest is becoming obsolete. The landscape has changed and you need to take note.
A Page like in isolation has very little statistical value, but throw in post likes, comments, shares, social connections & web activity you start to create a list of characteristics that is more akin to a psychological profile. This is also the cornerstone of Facebook Ads.
Every action you and your tribe take on Facebook contributes to every piece of collective data about you and what you really like and whether your Page is of interest to others. You can’t fool the Facebook algorithm, but you can train it.
Which is why there has never been a better time to focus on post likes, post reach and engagement.
How do you do this? Create content that is of interest to your fans, tells a story and resonates as to why people should pick you. Identify the right people at the right time. Start small and grow slowly. You are in this for the long-haul there’s no rush.
The solopreneur has the edge on this. You are the Facebook Mechanic. The Facebook Engineers who can share information about you, your service with passion and purpose. It doesn’t have to be perfect, just make progress and post!
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Do you have an attention grabbing strategy to turn the average in to #awesome?
Keeping-up with online communication is exhausting. You can find yourself going around in circles and, especially if tech is not your talent, it becomes a never-ending swirl of button pressing and you just simply find yourself hoping for the best.
So, let’s just take a step-back for a minute, and try and choose one thing to do this week that will reach out to your target audience.
YOUR Objective today: find an image that adds emotion to your message. Pop over to Canva and add some text. Post it on your Facebook page with words that explain to your audience what transformation you can provide for them. (tag me when you’re done)
Images or Videos are more likely to evoke an emotional response from your reader than text alone.
Show don’t just tell
Turn an idea into an action with inspiring visual content. Using the right visual, either images or videos will help take the audience on a journey with you, and amplify your message.
Here’s a top tip from me on how I use visuals to trigger the content for a Facebook post.
One of the keywords in this piece is “inspiration”. After writing a few sentences of my post/blog I start to think of an image that would work well with the initial concept to add vavavoom
I then go to my preferred royalty-free image provider, which happens to be Pixabay, and then type in the key word in the message I’m sharing.
In this particular instance there just so happened to be a light bulb image which caught my eye. If no image jumps out at me I pick another word and so on.
Sometimes the image I choose then changes the direction of the message I started with.
I continue to draft the content and jiggle things around until I’m happy to go live. The image helps me to focus the emotion & transformation that can occur and ultimately inspires my audience to take action.
I include tutorials on how to work with images for Facebook, how to add them effectively to a post, where to find them and how to add text overlay in my #FacebookFit Online boot-camp. Pop back soon for the next date announcement
Blog
Building Page Likes with truly valuable fans is fundamental to solid reach figures and engagement which leads to conversion.
Everyone wants Page Likes, as we know that starts the creation of our Tribe, but what can you do to make sure they are the right sort of tribe members who will like, comment and share and of course ultimately BUY from you?
Here is a list of skillful ways you can trigger quality likes without getting drawn in to unnecessary vanity metric
1.Join Groups where you can basically show-off your skills and build relationships with people who need your service/product.
Take time to get to know the manner and style of people in the group and be as helpful as possible BEFORE jumping in and making your own post.
Finding the right group for you may take some skill and may start away from Facebook initially with face to face marketing for example. Don’t be tempted to join as many groups as possible as you will just spread yourself too thin.
One hazard to look for in a Group is a random Like-fest, where you will be asked to Like each others pages – this is BAD. You will not obtain quality likes this way. A reciprocal like may appear the polite thing to do, but if it is a sympathy vote then it will not contribute towards your long term success with reach/engagement/conversion
2. Use videos or live stream.
Showing your realness and honesty will help buyers get to know you and grab there attention. Video has been tipped as a huge marketing tool for many years, but in the last 12 months with the advent of live stream and more sophisticated devices its so much easier than ever. If you’re camera shy and would like some top-tips on how to get started drop me a line or send a message via my page and we can have a chat and see what is holding you back.
3. Connect with other Pages. Using the B2B system for liking another page AND liking commenting and sharing as your business is a really great way of hanging out with the your potential tribe members.
If you interact on other pages in the right way, your name will be seen by many people who fit your target market.
These 3 strategies alone will, when done consistently, build your page the right way for long term success.
These and many more #FacebookWarrior tips are available directly from me if you choose to work on a 1:1 basis or attend a workshop. Get in contact now and fast-track your #FacebookFitness so you’re NOT left behind in this social media frenzy.
