Facebook’s latest update has businesses freaking out.
And guess what, YOUR marketing strategy is effected too.
The new algorithm change is cleaning house on advertisers that are abusing the platform, and leaving more room for you – the “Good” marketer.
Before you spend one more dime on marketing your app or business, learn about the new changes in the Facebook platform and what you can do to maximize your app cash-flow.
Here’s what you need to know…
1. Bye-Bye Greedy Businesses & Junk Promos
As it currently stands, ad space on Facebook is at high demand with low inventory.
To make room for more quality ads and content, Facebook is demoting fake news and clickbait posts.
“Facebook is looking for brands that drive discussion…not necessarily conversations that are one to many.” – Molly Pitman
Pages with low-engagment posts will result in less visibility in the News Feed and higher ad costs.
2. More Friends & Family
By demoting fake news and clickbait posts, you’re going to see more posts and interactions from friends and family in the News Feed.
That means more interactions about your cousin’s new baby, and less news stories and business promotions.
3. Influencers Boosted
The algorithm shift will also bring a lot more free exposure to Influencers.
Facebook categorizes Influencers as Individuals, the same status as friends and family. That means their posts will be boosted ahead of businesses, brands, and fan pages.
4. What This Means for Your App Business
Does this mean your Facebook pages and ads are obsolete?
Not at all.
Facebook is simply weeding out the negative promotions that are overcrowding the platform and taking away from the personal interactions Facebook was founded on.
Here are 6 key takeaways from this update:
4.1: Good marketers will continue to win.
Do good by your users, and your users will do good by you.
If you are focused on content marketing and building positive relationships with your users, you have nothing to worry about.
Continue serving your communities and strengthening relationships.
4.2: The Reach for Business’s Organic Posts Will Decline.
Businesses will likely see a significant decrease in organic reach.
Here is what the order for organic posts will most likely look like in the News Feed:
= 1) Friends & family posts and interactions
↑ 2) Influencers posts and interactions
↓ 3) Product/Brands/Business/Fan Pages posts
↓ 4) News posts
If you’re relying solely on organic traffic, there’s no need to panic, but start considering and researching paid advertising.
4.3: Pay to Play
Businesses and brands only have about a 2% chance of hitting their target audience from organic posts.
That’s practically nothing.
Unless you have partnerships or a huge organic reach, you need to incorporate paid advertising in your app’s marketing strategy.
Using ads with a high engagement level that are positive in nature will result in lower ad costs and higher conversions.
That means creating 2-way conversational ads that spark meaningful interactions between human beings, and not being overly promotional.
If you are brand new to Facebook Ads and want to learn how to get started, sign up to our Paid Traffic Hacking Workshop.
4.4: Live Videos + Facebook Messenger
Live videos will be favored even more in the latest algorithm change.
Zuckerberg wrote that “live videos often lead to discussion among viewers on Facebook—in fact, live videos on average get six times as many interactions as regular videos.”
Facebook Messenger also provides a personable 1-on-1 experience for users.
Messenger is a powerful tool, even with apps. You can engage with your users personally or setup automated messages that do the brunt work for you. If you’re interested, ManyChat is a great place to start.
Learn the 3 tips for making a winning Facebook Video Ad.
4.5: Start Partnering with Influencers.
If anything else, start working with Influencers.
Bring a great offer to the table, perfect your pitch, and focus on more Micro and Nano Influencers instead of shooting for Mega partnerships.
The days of Influencers not knowing how to monetize their content and community are over. It is going to be a lot easier and faster to find Influencers and form partnerships.
Get everything you need to find, contact, and partner with Influencers with our Influencer Blitz Program.
4.6: Variety is Key
Different people like different things.
You as a marketer need to constantly be looking for new places to advertise and hook your customer.
Your app needs at least 3 strong traffic sources to drive people to your app.
Start looking for new audiences and testing new ads.
Learn more about finding new audiences in our free video walkthrough.
To Sum Up…
Marketing your app takes time, creativity, and a lot of hard work.
But don’t cheat the algorithm (cheaters never prosper).
Keep Facebook and your followers happy by creating positive engaging experiences.
Lastly, this is your wakeup call to start working with Influencers.
When an Influencer posts content, it performs 5-10 TIMES BETTER than if a brand posts it. And those numbers are going to get even higher now that Facebook is removing brands from the feed.
The good marketers that stand for what is best for their users and humankind will continue to win.
Thanks for this helpful commentary.
What kind of news posts are being demoted? A lot of online marketers recommend writing online news and press releases to promote your company and products and share valuable information with users about industry trends, etc. Then they recommend sharing this content on the company Facebook page and other social media pages. … Is this still a good way to spend time? Or do you think it is less valuable than it was before?
Is there a way to make news stories more valuable and engaging to users? Or is any kind of news-related post generally being demoted, so it is best to focus on strictly entertaining posts like funny photos/videos?
Are company Facebook posts that are designed to educate people (for example, an informational article) considered part of “news”?
Finally, I was wondering – Is the Influencer Blitz program included in Emoji Arbitrage?
I look forward to hearing from you. Nice post!
@Brett – The news posts that are being demoted are from big companies like CNN, Buzzsumo, etc. Providing valuable info to your customers and followers is 100% acceptable. But do it in a way that provokes discussion. In the app world, Clash of Clans crushes this: https://www.facebook.com/ClashofClans/
Thank you for the post. I am fairly new to all this and about to run a campaign to validate an app idea I have that is in development. That means, no connection to influencers at this stage but rather trying to get a relevant side ad to a targeted audience to gauge interest on two key features. Will this affect side ads similarly to news feed ads? Any other considerations I should be paying attention to?
No. Your paid ads will not be effected. However, because brands and businesses will lose some exposure with their organic posts, they will move to more paid advertising campaigns on FB. Which will result in an increase in ad spend (less inventory, higher demand).
If you’re working with influencers, I would start searching and contacting influencers now. Once you have partnered with an influencer, you can ask them to post a poll to their FB group, or send a Google Form, etc…to get the data you need to gauge the interest in your key features. Once that is confirmed, you will have proof of what the audience wants and you will have a direct line to them. Next, all you have to do is build the product and connect the dots.
If interested, we are promoting a program that walks you through the process of finding, contacting, and partnering with Influencers:
bluecloudsolutions.com/influencer-blitz-program