Social media sites are constantly looking to improve user experience, Facebook included. Mark Zuckerberg announced several changes to the Facebook News Feed Algorithm at the start of 2018, which may have an impact on social media marketers. Although the new algorithm could have a potential negative impact on marketers, there is a way around it, meaning there is no need to worry.
How the New Algorithm Works
Facebook now awards posts with the highest engagement. Posts with more reactions, comments and likes will be awarded with a better position on the news feed. This was of course intended to improve user experience, but it does mean that marketers could be hit if they don’t promote a good user experience themselves.
However, if you stop thinking like a ‘marketer’ and start thinking like an ‘influencer,’ these changes could actually benefit you. You have the opportunity to have your posts prioritised if you adjust well to the new system.
Connect with the Audience
The way to increase user engagement and thus receive highly-rated posts is to stop thinking like a business. Being a good social media marketer now means acting like an influencer and aligning with your target audience. To do this, you need to truly understand your target audience and then blend your content into that.
It is recommended to run a competitive analysis. Find out who your competitors are and look into what they do to run successful campaigns. If they are successful, mimic them in some way. If you can see flaws in their campaigns, give the audience what they want by adapting and improving it.
Knowing who your target audience is, is vital. This seems obvious, but it is a crucial step in any marketing process. Try creating buyer personas so that you can better cater to their values and opinions. When doing this, conduct sufficient research rather than guessing. Some analytics tools are available to help you find an accurate audience demographic. In social media marketing, you can even try out geo-targeting to target people in specific locations with your ads. This can help you post at ideal times, as well as help you target people who will be more interested in your services.
Finally, targeting a brand-aware audience is a good idea. Finding a ‘warm audience,’ – i.e., people that are familiar with your brand or services and will be receptive – is likely to gte better results. This does not necessarily mean existing clients, but people who have seen or heard of you and not actually engaged with your content.
Running Ads
Make sure that you vary your advertising content. Using a variety of media including images and videos is a good way to ensure that the audience doesn’t get bored of seeing your content.
You should also pay attention to frequency because people will get bored or irritable if they see your ad too often. Try to make sure your ad doesn’t appear more than five times to the same customer.
Finally, you should avoid engagement bait as much as possible. These posts will be penalised by Facebook’s new algorithm, meaning you should avoid ads that bait viewers into voting, reacting or sharing. These posts may even deter users because they seem like spam.
Final Thoughts
The Facebook algorithm introduced for 2018 is not actually a death sentence for marketers. If you adapt to the system through clever marketing techniques, you are sure to get a successful marketing campaign.
