Marketing

Oh No. Not Again!

Welp. It’s happening again. Facebook has changed the rules.

Just when you think you’ve got the big dogs mastered (i.e., Facebook and Google), one of them goes and changes everything. Facebook wants their users spending time viewing content from family and friends instead of a news feed cluttered with business content. So they have drastically scaled back what they are allowing on your newsfeed from publishers or businesses.

The head of Facebook’s News Feed team, Adam Mosseri, said the preference for news from family and friends “means we’ll show less public content, including videos and other posts from publishers or businesses.”

Translation: You’ve got to pay to play if you are a business.

As expected, Facebook is further monetizing what it offers to businesses vs. people. This has always been a part of their business model (after all, they are a business too!). So organic feed items will be less prominent for businesses, but they won’t totally go away.

This change also doesn’t mean your marketing has to suffer, it just means your content has to be well-thought out in advance, strategic to the market you are attempting to impact, and engaging enough to pass through the Facebook “business” filter.

Organic content will still leave a footprint, but that footprint will be decreasing with these new rules. With these changes, paid becomes even more important for reaching your audience with meaningful content.

Here’s the good news. Losing unlimited access to the News Feed feature doesn’t mean your marketing has to suffer. We know this because Facebook did the same thing in 2016 and no one’s marketing toppled over (d’oh! forgot about that change did we?!) Here are 2 strategies to keep building momentum with marketing despite the Facebook changes.

Strategy 1: Remind and reward your brand evangelists

You probably have loyal customers who actually want to see posts from their favorite brand (you!). Remind them that they can go to their News Feed tab in Facebook and prioritize the pages and people whose posts they want to see. Remind them that they can do this! Send out an email blast, post on all of your social media channels the process to continue following you. You might even consider posting a discount coupon or something similar to grab their attention and get them to follow you.

Our Marketing Field Guide outlines several different ways to secure organic attention from loyal followers on Facebook, and this post shares 5 ways to use pay per click ads to grow your sales.

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Strategy 2: Show, don’t tell.

Video is the best way to show users what you do, what you offer, and how you can help them. These videos don’t have to be feature-length films, nor do they have to be difficult to create. We’ve worked with several different organizations in creating short, social media video animations that have helped them make an impact on their target market that’s like, whoa!

Here are some examples of animated videos and short videos we designed for clients that they have been able to boost on social media. 

So rest assured, not all is lost! We can help ensure your social media marketing stays top of mind, and in this case, top of the News Feed. Contact us today to learn more!