3 most important things for businesses to learn from the new Facebook Algorithm
On January 11, 2018 Mark Zuckerburg announced upcoming changes on what will be seen in the Facebook news feed. Essentially there has been significant feedback that there has been too much content that is unrelated to the user. The boom of Facebook ads has caused almost all businesses to jump on-board in some way of another. The tidal wave of new advertising clients has led to an overflow for Facebook into the feeds of everyone. In an attempt to recover from the negative reaction, Facebook is willing to take a loss in overall app interaction to trade for a “more valuable” experience. So what does this mean? Fortunately, business pages won’t be moved to the explore tab but will remain in the news feed; just less often. This doesn’t mean that your business should drop Facebook as a way to advertise and connect to your customers. Instead, it is just an inevitable change that is happening in a similar way across all digital marketing platforms. Here are the 3 most important things to do to prepare for the update:
1. If you don’t do video, then you better start.
There are multiple mentions by Zuckerburg that video tends to draw the largest participation. In fact, Facebook live videos get 6 times more interaction than other videos. Be sure that you will see even more video in feeds; so get prepared to catch moments that show how your business is relevant. It has been proven that just putting out content that only relates to your products won’t generate the most leads (or any). You need something that makes the customer feel like they are involved. Businesses sometimes feel uncomfortable with live video (especially if you’ve never done it before) but now is a good time to practice and get acquainted with it before the changes.
2. Just because people see you don’t mean you’ll get leads.
Gone are the days where you could just have someone create something with some buzzwords and get feedback. Now that we have had platforms like Facebook since 2004 (yes 14 years ago), the public is very accustomed to how social media works and how to navigate quickly. This means that unless you have something real to catch their attention, you’ll get completely ignored. So take this as an opportunity to make sure that you understand your place in the market. Decide what makes you unique, important and necessary. Then take those things and put them into a format that people will notice. That way, even if businesses are viewed less, they will still see yours because people will be talking about you. Overall that’s the goal for Facebook, to show more content that people want to engage and talk about.
3. Realize that social media will continue changing.
Years ago, you could rank for keywords and receive a ton of web traffic. Now you have to have a strong network in addition to the rankings. The future will begin to facilitate changes that will weed out businesses that cannot adapt to change. Amazingly, research shows that people spend up to 9 hours a day on social media. There have been platforms like Myspace that have come and gone. Plus, the amount of changes made by companies like Google are so massive that it’s mind boggling to list. Businesses who wish to succeed need 2 things; relevance and diversity. More than ever having knowledge of changes and upcoming changes can make or break your entire marketing strategy. Always have more than one channel bringing in leads. That way if one becomes obsolete, you still have a funnel of potential clients.
We pride ourselves in always taking time to stay in front of changes and trends so that our clients never run out of leads. If you are concerned about your future marketing or how to remain profitable, reach out to us and let’s have a conversation.
