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Should You ‘Pay to Play’ on Facebook?

Should You ‘Pay to Play’ on Facebook?

Facebook

If you own or manage a Facebook business page, I’m sure you’ve noticed something funny going on. All of a sudden less people are liking, sharing and even seeing your posts. You start asking yourself, what’s going on? Why doesn’t anyone like me anymore? What happened?

Well first off, it’s not your fault. Facebook has once again changed their algorithm, making it harder and harder for you to reach your customers or clients without ‘paying to play.’ No longer are these the good ole days when you could reach a significant number of your followers through organic reach. Despite this change, I’ve found a few clever ways to manage your page, allowing you to potentially reach your customers without using the ‘pay to play’ model. Once you develop your organic reach, boosting your odds of reaching more followers will become cheaper and easier.

Facebook2Do’s

  • Embed videos into Facebook. Videos now play automatically (like Instagram) when users scroll through their timeline. This tactic is known to bypass the Facebook algorithm as long as you embed the video and don’t paste a YouTube or third-party website link.
  • Post more often, using 10 words or less. This will likely get additional users to see your post. However, be careful with this method, Facebook likes consistency. If you post three times a day, stick to that. Facebook will assume you have stopped managing your page and not push your posts if you do not stick to your schedule. Make sure you develop a schedule that works for you
  • Use Facebook Insights. This is a really great tool to help you track which posts tend to receive more traction from your users. Once you figure out what your followers are more drawn to, you can then use this information to formulate new posts that will likely have a higher chance of getting liked and shared.
  • Every now and then re-post old content that received a high number of likes, comments and shares. You know it worked already, so keep it going!
  • Re-post a viral post from a page with a high level of engagement. This will allow you to be discovered by other users and feed off the traffic generated from that post. Ensure you check out the page you are re-posting from. Pages with low levels of engagement can also hurt your reach.

Don’ts

  • Never post links along with hash tags; use only one at a time
  • Try not to use hash tags (yes, I know you love them but they really are a no-no) unless they are directly related to your business or have a high level of engagement. If you really like hash tags, use them to come up with an engaging promotion.
  • Only tag pages that have a high engagement rate. Tagging pages with low engagement can negatively affect you.
  • Do not buy followers, these people will not interact with your page or ever see your posts