Facebook is continually changing its algorithms and policies. Before 2012, businesses could set up Facebook pages with ease and start collecting fans, after which they could post whatever content they pleased knowing full well that the content would reach their ever-growing fan base.
Today, things have changed significantly. You can no longer guarantee that your next business post is going to reach your fan base, and that’s because Facebook has made changes to its algorithm to prevent users from being inundated with endless streams of information.
As it stands, at the moment there are approximately 1,500 stories competing for the limelight on a user’s News Feed at a given moment, but only 300 of those stories get featured on that feed.
That’s all well and good, but as a business trying to reach your fans and spread the word about your latest project, post or offer, it can be incredibly frustrating to realise that your posts are simply not getting the exposure that they deserve.
You’ve followed all the rules: you’ve written a great post, you’ve tailored it to your target market and you’ve made it visually engaging. You’ve crafted a gripping headline and have included a compelling call-to-action at the end. Despite all of this, your post is still failing to reach out to a large audience base.
The reasons for this are simple.
Unless you pay to promote your post, the chances of it reaching a large audience base are quite low. According to Facebook, paid advertising is one of the most efficient options if you want to broadcast your post and reach a massive crowd. This may seem unfair, but unfortunately, in our highly competitive times, this has become the easiest way for Facebook to filter content and prevent users’ feeds from being overwhelmed with business content.
Countless businesses have disputed these changes, stipulating that their fans have chosen to like their pages because they enjoy the content and want to enjoy more of it. But in an age where it’s possible to ‘buy’ fans, per-post engagement is suffering as a result.
Nevertheless, there are ways around this if you aren’t interested in paying.
To the left-hand side of the Facebook homepage is a button that says ‘Pages Feed’. Here your audience can access all content posted by the brands that they follow, including yours. You should also encourage your fans to engage with your posts, whether by liking, commenting on or sharing your posts. This tells Facebook that this particular individual enjoys your content, and as such more of your content will show up in their news feeds.
You can also encourage your users to click on the ‘Liked’ button at the top of your page and filter their preferences so that your posts are always seen in their newsfeeds.
Content of the very highest quality stands a far better chance of being seen organically by your audience. Facebook recognises high-quality content immediately and boosts its visibility as a result, so if you have worked hard on your content and done your utmost to ensure that it is interesting, engaging and unique, it has a much higher chance of being viewed.
Finally, if you have published a post that reached a huge organic audience, then from here you can choose to promote it further through paid advertising. You don’t need to pay for every post you publish, but if a particular post has generated a notable amount of attention, it might make sense to amplify its reach further and generate an even greater response.
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