The Future of Facebook

The future of Facebook — especially when it comes to marketing — remains a hot topic. 

While some have predicted the social media giant will die a slow death, others expect Facebook’s monthly rollout of new features to keep users active and engaged. And let’s face it, we’re all still checking out those baby photos and wishing our aunts a happy birthday now and then. 

But what started this debate over Facebook’s vitality? 

Why would we ask, “Is Facebook marketing dying?” in the first place?

The Hot Goss

For many, the question of Facebook’s death has been led by a steady decline of organic reach.

In 2018, Facebook updated how they track your organic reach. Back in the day, you would get credit for reaching someone if your content showed up in their refreshed feed — even if they didn’t view your post.

The 2018 update flipped it around a bit. Now your organic reach was tracked by “viewable impressions,” which only counted once your post shows up on a person’s screen. 

Users have to actually see your post for it to contribute to your organic reach stats. (Even if they scroll on by, though!) 

This made organic reach metrics appear worse. But, wait, there’s more! 

It’s an Update Party

Last year, Facebook underwent hundreds of updates, like adding Live video ads, designing our entire interface, and creating new messenger features like linking Facebook and Instagram messages and comments in one spot on Facebook’s platform. Hard-working social media managers worldwide were suddenly forced to change their strategies and explain to their teams what the heck this meant for their pages.

And it’s continuing: This year, Facebook has made a big shift to promoting content posted in Groups and Events over other types of content. In COVID times, it’s all about connecting. (Get our tips for using groups here.)

Dwindling organic campaign results can easily discourage people from using Facebook to market their businesses and organizations and begin looking for new platforms to master.

But Facebook marketing is not dead. 

The reality is that Facebook constantly evolves, and it’s easy to grow complacent and forget to evolve our marketing strategies too. 

Give these tricks a try and see if your organic reach on Facebook starts to perk up.

Don’t Forget Your Fans

Page Likes and follower counts are important, but those numbers don’t matter if your following grows stale. 

Engagement is vital to keeping existing followers and attracting new ones. (So much so that the Facebook algorithm scrutinizes your post engagements to determine how to prioritize your content.) 

Start by creating content that encourages responses, to increase your engagement. Then make sure you respond to comments and initiate conversations. 

This will show your audience that you care and improve your standing with Facebook’s algorithm. Plus you never know where those conversations may lead. Remember to be a good host on your Facebook page: positive interaction, match your audience’s energy and address any trolling head-on. 

Review Your Content

Quality will always beat quantity, but what if you’re sharing valuable content, and people aren’t seeing it?

There could be a few reasons for that. 

You’ve angered the Facebook algorithm.

Although its algorithm is complex, Facebook primarily uses four major factors (your relationship to the user, the content type, post popularity, and how recently it was posted) to determine what and when to share. For example, Facebook discourages direct calls to “like,” “comment,” “tag,” or “share” content. Language like that leads to fewer Newsfeed appearances and, therefore, lower organic reach rates. 

So, review your content and see if you’re violating Facebook’s rules. 

Marketing on the platform is a careful balance of working with the algorithm while still engaging your audience.

Speaking of audience...

You may be missing the target (audience)

You may not be getting the results you want because your content isn’t connecting with your audience.

It’s easy and comfortable to share what WE like. But we aren’t our ideal audience. Or, to put that another way, you probably aren’t trying to convince yourself to follow or work with your own business.

When creating content, it’s more than what you’re sharing: it’s also what values you’re promoting. 

For example, Sharpie has done a great job of sharing content that interests and grabs the users’ attention who love their products. 

They know their customers love the bright colors, the satisfaction of a clean line, or color-coding their lives. 

Sharpie’s recent content not only features videos to show their products in use, but they share content from their customers, involving and showing the people who use the product more than the product itself.

 What type of content does your audience really want? 

You can easily look up the product details of a Sharpie pen or marker, but a video of someone perfectly coloring inside the lines is much more satisfying. And you can imagine yourself doing the same activity, too.

Your content is pitch-heavy. 

Most people don’t want to see a bunch of ads on their Newsfeed. If your Facebook page heavily promotes services or products, you could actually be hurting yourself more than helping. 

We like to mix things up regularly and keep a solid 1:3 ratio of sales/promo posts to engagement or high value posts. 

Here’s an example.

Let’s assume you’re promoting an upcoming fundraising event. In addition to a promotional post that highlights the event, you’d also want to share three generally unrelated or non-promotional posts that offer value to your audience. 

This could be a link to a new blog post, a question to encourage conversation, or a simple inspirational quote — something that doesn’t feel like promotion and adds something to the user’s day. Can you surprise or delight your audience? Make them laugh? Make them think?

Bottom line: There’s a reason funny animal videos win the internet, every time. Find your company’s version of a Day in the Life of an Adorable Squirrel and get to sharing!

Facebook isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, but it is evolving, and we must evolve along with it. 

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