Facebook algorithm change – what it means for businesses

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[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]In January 2018, Mark Zuckerberg announced major changes to the Facebook newsfeed. The algorithm changes will be rolled out over the coming months.

“Last week I announced a major change to encourage meaningful and social interactions with family and friends over passive consumption. Last week I announced a major change to encourage meaningful social interactions with family and friends over passive consumption. As a result, you’ll see less public content, including news, video, and posts from brands…” writes Mark Zuckerberg

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What this means for your newsfeed

You will see more content from people (friends and family), less from businesses and media. This is an attempt to combat the fake news epidemic and to provide a more “meaningful” news feed.  

Facebook will be prioritising the following:

Trusted Sources

Ensure your page is considered trustworthy by engaging with your community. Likes and comments indicate trustworthiness.

Informative Content

Post content that educates and delights. Avoid clickbait at all costs.

Local News

Facebook claim users want to see more local news. If you have a local business with engaging news this may help you reach relevant customers. We need to see how this rolls out.

What this means for business

  • Until the changes have been rolled out no one precisely knows the impact on brands. We’ll keep you updated as the rollout continues throughout 2018.
  • It’s likely that businesses will see a decrease in organic traffic which means a necessary increase in ad spend
  • Trustworthy pages will be prioritised.
  • Influencers’ power will continue to grow. Influencers are people with a large, highly engaged audience. Brands often partner with influencers to promote their products or services. In theory, influencers should continue to dominate the news feed unless Facebook decide to treat their posts like other businesses.

Useful Tips for businesses

  • Encourage your audience to add your page to the Facebook see first function
  • Encourage interaction: use Facebook Live, create high quality content to increase engagement
  • Make conversation a two-way street. Chat  with your followers whenever possible.. When people consistently interact (comment and like) with your posts, this tells Facebook you brand is trusted and popular. 
  • It will still be important to grow your following on and offline. Encourage your customers to “like” your page.
  • Increase advertising spend. As organic reach declines it will be important to run targeted advertising to reach new customers.

We will keep you updated with the changes and best practice advise as the rollout continues throughout the year.

Sources

Facebook

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