The world of social media is constantly evolving. Following Facebook's recent update, we've collected some thoughts on what it involves, what it means for businesses and how to adapt to the change.
Four days into 2018 and a reflective status from Mark Zuckerberg hinted at some big changes, describing that the platform had “a lot of work to do”. One week later, and this Facebook algorithm update was announced from the Head of News Feed.
So, what has prompted the change?
If you’ve ever come across a post telling you to like and share if you love *insert food/beverage/animal here*, you have probably felt the frustration of spammy posts clogging up your newsfeed. This is just one example of content that is causing a rise in passive users of the platform.
Facebook has listened, and understands that people are missing out on what matters to them. The major algorithm change hopes to reduce the time spent aimlessly scrolling, by facilitating “deeper, more meaningful interactions”.
This means person to person exchanges between friends will be pushed further up the newsfeed, and prioritized over public content from brands and publishers. Put simply, posts with a two-way dialogue, lengthy comments and anything that encourages you to take interest are favoured. Whereas before it was largely based on likes and shares, now the element of dialogue is equally important.
Should social marketers and businesses be worried? Adam Mosseri explained that some pages might feel a slight decrease in reach and referral traffic, but the impact will vary.
We have put together some tips on steps you can take to ensure you don’t fall behind.
Spark a conversation
As comments are king in the eyes of the Algorithm update, try and create chatter on your posts. For those among us who use Facebook predominantly to drive traffic away from the platform, whether to your homepage or a blog, this could do you more harm than good. With the new update, it is all about interaction directly with the post, so it is important to keep people on your Facebook page.
Make it a two-way thing
It’s all very well encouraging comments from users through your posts, but it is vital for you to get involved too. Try and make sure you reply to all comments posted, whether it is a simple thank you or continuing the conversation, bring your brand to life.
Go Live
As one of Facebook’s prominent features, they will always encourage going live. The interactive nature of live video increases your favourability of the algorithm, and is an exciting way of engaging your audience. In addition, this is a great way to keep users on the platform, and particularly your page, for longer. Find out all about going live here.
Avoid Engagement Bait
Our final point is more of a what not to do. Ensure the comments you do receive are genuine, otherwise Facebook will consider this engagement bait and push the post further down the feed. Encouraging people to leave one-word comments, for example, will not work with the algorithm.
We’re pretty social savvy here at Bluestep. Get in touch if you’d like to find out more about campaign management and social media opportunities for your business or service.