Within the last month, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced that the well known timeline will have a dramatic overhaul which will favour posts from friends over businesses.
This came as a surprise to many as pictures, videos and relatable content do so well on the platform and generate a lot of revenue for Facebook. Mark’s reason for making this change? Here’s a quote from his personal facebook:
It’s understandable that User Experience is high on Facebook’s priority list but what does this mean for brands and businesses? And most importantly, what can we do about it? Here are 4 things your company can do, to minimise the damaging effect that limited facebook exposure will have on your business.
High quality content is going to be paramount in the new Facebook ecosystem. Having high quality content that resonates with a large audience will naturally be promoted by the community and this means not having to rely on the Facebook algorithm to show your posts. Moving forward, make sure the content that your brand creates is polished, eye catching and promotes your message subtly and smoothly, to avoid lower engagement and reach from your target audience.
Since you’re going up against having a limited reach, it’s imperative to maximise the number of potential users who will be exposed to your post. According to multiple sources, the best times to post on Facebook are 9am 1pm and 3pm and you will have the highest possible engagement on Saturday and Sunday. If you’re required to spend more time and effort making high quality content, it may be good practice to post sparingly throughout the week and more at the weekend when your post is likely to get more exposure.
Companies with large marketing budgets are definitely going to prosper over the little guy. The amount that companies will be required to spend will drastically increase and ad space and exposure will come at a premium. Spending more = a higher chance of being seen by your target audience. Although this solution isn’t ideal, if you can afford to, it may be worth it.
This option should be reserved for a worst case scenario basis. If you continue to use facebook and get some engagement, then posting will still be worth it, but as soon as you’re spending more than you’re getting back, it might be time to cut ties and focus on other social networks. The facebook algorithm decides which posts to display whereas sites like Twitter operate on a real time basis, so your post will be displayed to your followers whenever you decide to release it, rather than being at the mercy of an algorithm.
As of right now, we are still fairly in the dark about what will happen to the content that we post on Facebook–we are at the mercy of an algorithm. Facebook ad placement and marketing has always been somewhat of a trial and error process and although these tips will stand you in good stead, they should not be taken as gospel. Depending on the size of your audience, the type of company you are and the kind of content you create will all sway the myriad of different factors that affect the reach of your content. We can only hope that things won’t be too bad — but if they are, there’s always twitter
