In January 2018, Mark Zuckerberg announced that Facebook would change its news feed algorithm to favor content from friends, family, and groups instead of businesses, brands and news outlets.
The news feed algorithm determines which content visitors will see first on their feeds. By default, Facebook will show posts they think the users are more interested in rather than the newest posts.
This change in the news feed puts businesses and organizations with Facebook Pages at a disadvantage. Likes and clickthroughs are no longer the name of the game on Facebook. Businesses will need to adapt to this new algorithm by following Facebook’s guidelines to drive organic interaction. Here is what you should know to keep engagement going on your Facebook page
Pro Tip: Check Your Notifications
If you consider yourself a power user of Facebook on mobile, you probably get countless notifications for different Facebook posts. Before you start disabling notifications that appear too often for your liking, make a note of which notifications you get most often.
Do most of your notifications come from Facebook groups, live videos, or events? Compare notes with others who check their notifications and use this collected information to determine what your new Facebook strategy will be.
Encourage “Active Interactions”
Facebook’s News Feed algorithm wants to re-shift the focus towards “conversation and meaningful interactions between people” according to Mark Zuckerberg on Facebook’s newsroom.
Facebook’s News Feed algorithm now gives priority to what Hootsuite calls “active interactions”. More emotionally driven reactions such as “Haha” or “Love” are weighed more actively than likes, since users make more effort to hit those reactions than one click it takes to like. The most active interactions for the new algorithm include commenting and sharing.
Marketers on Facebook should develop content that drives interaction, such as asking a question or sharing timely stories that are relevant to the page’s audience.
Create a Facebook Group Associated with Your Page.
Mark Zuckerberg’s announcement mentioned that groups will get a higher priority on news feeds. Facebook page owners can either create groups administered within the page or link an existing group to a page. This allows pages to drive further interaction between members of the group and create a common audience that receives notifications.
As a page administrator, you can find this feature un the vertical left menu on your page under “Groups”
You can either keep the same name or, make the group name more personal with words such as “Friends of the organization” or “Supporters of our page”
Create Events
Events are another avenue to drive engagement for your followers that is favored by the News Feed algorithm. You can think up creative milestones or online events such as a donation drive, a countdown for a feature or product, or a sale. Facebook Events also push notifications to followers. Their friends often see the events they are interested in or going to.
Avoid Engagement Bait
Facebook now demotes content that they consider “engagement bait” from the News Feed. Engagement bait is a type of post that calls the user to take an action on it. Examples of engagement bait include phrases such as “Like if you agree with us” and “Tag a friend that drinks a lot of coffee”
Facebook’s publisher guide clarifies that posts that ask for recommendations or raising money for causes “will not be adversely impacted by this update”
Make Videos to Drive Your Message
According to Facebook for Media blog, Video content tends to drive more meaningful interactions
It’s not simply enough to upload the same video from YouTube. Facebook videos often have bold text on top of the video and hardcoded captions to attract visitors to unmute, watch, and react to videos going through their news feeds.
According to Mark Zuckerberg’s announcement, live videos on average get six times more interactions than regular uploaded videos.
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