The latest updates to Facebook‘s Rank algorithm, based on the visibility of feeds on the homepage, has become the most discussed topic of the moment because it hurts those who, for years, have based a part of their business marketing on the Social Network.
The famous likes, comments and spontaneous re-shares are useful in order to stay in the top positions of the home and, therefore, “get noticed.” As of December 5, things are more complicated. If within a few minutes the post does not get interactions, it is banished forever into the abyss of the web, becoming invisible.
The platform managers hide behind a “intensifying quality posts, increasing the real interest of users.” In reality, the ill-thinkers venture a totally different hypothesis: monetize the spaces and force us to create paid advertisements, so as to guarantee visibility.
The underlying reasoning is obvious, they want to encourage advertising investments, forcing us to create advertisements in order to“relaunch” online business. “But I don’t have to relaunch anything at all!” you’ll say. For Facebook you do; haven’t you paid until now? Now you pay in order to get user engagement. After all, should you want to advertise on television or in the streets, you would have to pay.
As we also mentioned in the previous article on Post Ads, web advertising is gaining momentum, not that it was nonexistent before, but we are currently getting a disproportionate increase in advertising that is particularly affecting social.
Why? Simple. Social is part of our daily lives. It is a proven fact that most of our day revolves 70 percent around a Network. Objective? Perhaps the famous “stay tuned” on everything and everyone. It doesn’t matter what is in front of us, the important thing is to be tuned in and, alas, findable. So, why not make money on this desire of ours to “stay online” and make our business known? The shift toward sponsorship seems a foregone conclusion. Facebook is a platform that for too long has hosted our “ramblings” and pandered to our advertising, albeit implicitly. Perhaps the time has come to repay what we have been “exploiting” for years?
Facebook FanPages: between protests and closures
In the document titled“Generating business results on Facebook,” they admit that they expect “a decrease over time in the organic distribution of single page posts” and reiterate their intention to want to “make the experience people have with our platform more and more meaningful,” and urge brand page editors to pay for distribution “to maximize the performance of the message within the news feed.” On the one hand, then, we have the large Facebook platform and, on the other, the editors of companies that for years have set a small part of their promotion on FanPages, getting great feedback, and who see, suddenly, the collapse of visits. Some FanPage administrators try to keep going by stepping up their traffic as best they can, averting an improvement; others, however, rebel and protest. How? By closing the pages.
There are also those who, like Calcionapoli.24, have gone to court and the Antitrust Authority, accusing Facebook of “advertising damage” to their company. The manager of the page in question went directly to one of the official offices in Dublin, here he was asked for an investment of 10 thousand euros per month in order to re-establish proper visibility and be placed in the home as newsfeed, otherwise … the collapse. The matter goes on with countless twists and turns, all the way to the Court of Appeals. What is being claimed is not free service but more respect and fairness to those who “eat” with shares and likes. The resolution is still pending.
But this is not the only case of protest. The page of a tourism startup, WeekendGoGo, also complains that it has invested time and money in Social Media and, lately, has witnessed a resounding collapse. For this reason, it has shut down numerous pages in recent hours and posted protest messages against the “giant,” which it promptly reiterated:
“To get visibility, it takes more than content: you have to invest.”
What to do for visibility?
Unfortunately, it has to be admitted, it is a dog biting its own tail … and over and over again. Without real investment, a link or post only goes viral with the help of users who facilitate circulation. But to make it happen you need visibility for a substantial number of people. To date, if you don’t sponsor, it’s a long shot.
There aren’t many alternatives, except to try to anticipate “decline” by analyzing the necessary steps and get visibility without the need to pay. The skill of those who work with social lies precisely in this. In this regard, for a good social media marketing plan you need to know that:
- comments count more than shares, which in turn outnumber likes;
- the algorithm takes into account the age of the interactions, the value of which decreases as they age;
- Getting friends to comment and “like” is wrong! The more people related to the managers interact on the page-multiple times and always the same-the more Facebook imagines to a non-spontaneous pass;
- at the same time, if our friends comment, or whatever, Facebook might infer that we are also interested in the news by putting it in plain sight.
The impression is that this is just the beginning of the meltdown. Facebook does not intend to retrace its steps and aims to make money on companies’ need for advertising; the latter are on the warpath. In the meantime, we continue to do our work and wait.
Sooner or later, will users quit Facebook and turn to other horizons-Social?
