Facebook is that amazing platform that lets you reach millions of people all over the world and there are two ways to do so. You can either reach them by paying Facebook or you can reach them organically.
The only problem is, reaching people organically or without paying Facebook has largely declined since 2014.
Which means that fewer people are actually able to see our posts, and on Facebook, this means fewer likes, clicks, comments and shares.
If you’re an advertiser on Facebook, you’d know that this means, fewer customers, fewer leads and fewer conversions.
And this can get seriously frustrating for business owners.
The truth is, there are simply too many Pages on Facebook, creating too much content for too many people. Think of it this way, Facebook is just a platform. A user’s News Feed has only limited space for Pages content, and basically, too many people are competing to reach that limited space!
So Facebook’s strategy is to make sure that the limited space on your Newsfeed is only occupied by the BEST content.
And by best, Facebook means Relevant.
From a user’s perspective, this is great. But for business, this makes getting more Reach much more difficult.
But remember, there’s always a way to get around this and it starts from understanding the way Facebook works.
So, Facebook has an algorithm called EdgeRank that will judge and rank your posts.
Think of a Facebook post. It could contain text, images, videos and links. Now if your post contains all these elements, then your post will rank higher than one that doesn’t.
And your post will then be delivered to a lot more people.
Also, some elements rank higher than the other. Text ranks low, links higher, images even better and videos get the best scores.
Facebook also ranks posts based on the level of engagement. So the more comments, like and shares you receive, the more people will view your post.
And likewise, if your post doesn’t have much engagement going on then your ranking drops and so will your post’s delivery.
There also exists the ‘Timing’ factor. The older a post gets, the more it’s ranking decreases.
If you look at it from Facebook’s perspective, then it all makes sense because they just want users to be more in touch with content that they can relate to, content that’s fresh and content that’s good.
Now to get around this algorithm, it’s pretty simple.
Analyze our Facebook posts and see which are the ones that got the most engagement and maximize those kind of posts in your strategy.
For instance, if your images get more engagement then your audience responds better to images. So make sure you have social media posts include more images.
Insider’s Tip: To increase your engagement rate, check your highest performing posts on a weekly basis and boost the top one for a small amount. This way, you’ll drive more engagement to your existing posts and you’re investing on better reach for your future posts as well.
So remember, the goal is to drive engagement and subsequently get better reach and not vice-versa. The more people that engage with your posts with likes, shares and comments, the better all your future posts will fare.