Facebook is one of the most used tools worldwide. This social network is a pioneer in the world of publications and mass messages. Even in Peru, 96% of users have a presence on this platform, according to Ipsos. But Facebook like other social networks has evolved, has been updated and has constantly modified its reach. All this to provide a better experience to its users. 

From the “like” button to modifications in its distribution and algorithm. In reality, all these additions have meant adapting to new practices to promote and become known to brands. In its early days, Facebook allowed each user to view content squarely and chronologically. Then everything changed and in the news sections the content that is shown to the user is only what Facebook considers will be interesting for him. 

This level Facebook only tries, like other platforms, that you stay longer in the application. But do it, consuming useful content. For that reason when making content for Facebook it is important to take into account the following factors.

Important updates from Facebook

In 2007, Facebook launched its fan pages, where everyone had access to create a page for their company or business, this allowed you to:

✔Start attracting followers and posting unlimited messages to your fanbase, with the certainty that they would always see those messages.

Then five years later, it was evidenced by page administrators that only 16% of their Facebook followers managed to see the posts of their page in the breaking news section. But it was in 2014 that engagement totally fell. Why was this really happening? The organic reach had plummeted according to some experts for pages of up to 20 thousand fans could only have an engagement of 2%. 

Then Facebook released an update to its algorithm, where it let it be known that the breaking news page had been adjusted to prioritize content from family and friends within Facebook accounts.

Facebook’s chief engineering officer, Lars Backstrom, warned at the time that pages could experience a drop in their organic reach even lower than 1%, mentioned above. If you want to read Backstrom’s full note, you can see it here. 

For 2017, Facebook made its biggest adjustment in the breaking news section, completely eliminating advertising or separating the content of the editor from the personal content. Which meant that Facebook was clearly dividing these two types of content to provide “a better user experience”, which according to them entered Facebook with higher priority to know updates from family and friends. 

In this way the advertising could be found next to the news section with the name: Advertising and in a small box. 

After the Facebook data misuse incident by Cambridge AnalyticaEste, Facebook had to make other modifications that focused on: “less content from pages and more content from friends and family.” An update that although it did not eliminate the content of the pages in the news section, it did place certain points as a priority to favor the content. These priorities would be: 

1. They would take your content into account if it’s shared through Facebook Messenger.
2.  Content that, in addition to being shared on other profiles, is also commented on and has interactions. 
3. Content that received responses to what was commented. 

All this would be considered by Facebook as meaningful interactions, which in turn tells Facebook that the user wants to continue seeing things like that and in this way news from pages could continue to appear at the beginning. Although not with the same viralization as before.

In 2019 and after the sanctions for an alleged violation of user privacy, Facebook sought to vindicate itself and announced improvements in its algorithm to protect the privacy of users. The changes ranged from the design to improve navigation to the improvement of its instant messaging. In this note they say at that time how the messages in Messenger would have a special encryption so that Facebook can see the content. 

The idea of ​​these changes was also to improve the experience with the things most used by users and also to create private interfaces for greater security. The platform has since put more emphasis on security and also tells fan pages that interactions on their content would become the primary basis for appearing in other people’s feeds. For this reason, in addition to paying for advertising, you must make sure that the content is up to the consumer. Avoid by all means, sharing fake news and links to other accounts, because you could be penalized.

Factors of the content that Facebook takes into account

✔ The affinity of people for different tastes will be taken into account. In other words, Facebook can show your content to people who have fondness for your type of account. However, for a company to organically reach several people, it is not possible. Because for that the user will have to have interacted with you before, for which you must promote yourself so that they see you.

✔Priority of content, it turns out that Facebook gives more relevance to content that is uploaded directly to the platform, so if you upload a video or a photo directly to Facebook instead of a link, you will have greater reach.  

✔Goodbye to Clickbaiting on Facebook, in 2017 this social network announced an important modification in its algorithm where it is no longer allowed to obtain traffic with content that encourages the purchase of a product directly, at least not in an organic way. Well, in this social network it was quite used to attract traffic to other websites with viralized content. In this way, the new algorithm ensures that people see fewer stories designed to attract clicks and more stories associated with what the user usually enjoys the most. 

✔ Interesting content, in relation to the previous one, your content should be interesting enough to be found by your target audience. But also it should not incite the click, everything should happen naturally. Use in this case: more videos, funny gifs or real images. Make original content and increase your engagement with your followers. That is, content that encourages “Like” naturally or to be shared.

How to have more reach on Facebook?

Many companies that advertised on Facebook before the updates, claimed that it has become more difficult but not impossible. Well, improving your brand engagement can help your publications have a greater reach in this well-known social network. That is, your strategy should contemplate playing with content that generates more comments and is shared by users. 

But it is important to take into account that the Facebook algorithm update in 2011 had a slightly more in-depth update and added machine learning. This change made the publications appear according to the preferences of each person, taking into account what they interact with. more. But Facebook itself has identified content formats that make it possible to improve the reach of content, such as: videos that are directly uploaded to it and live videos. This second is rated very well by the Facebook algorithm because it receives interactions instantly.  

But taking this into account, you should:

✔ Add more Live videos to your content strategy.

✔ Upload videos automatically to the platform and do not use YouTube links to do so.

✔Create content to generate reactions much more than to incentivize a purchase. 

✔Use specific keywords in your written posts. 

✔ Get people to share you to reach others through them.

Conclusions: 

Is organic reach possible on Facebook?

Since 2011, organic reach on Facebook is not possible if your goal is to sell. This is why many pages saw a great decrease in their interactions. It is important to understand that Facebook wants people to be able to have the best content through this social network, what is the best content? the one that is associated with your tastes. In this way, pages that report false news are avoided and they are not contributing anything with their content. 

If you are a business page and you are starting on Facebook, you will most likely have to pay for advertising, in order to get people who are interested in your content. So you have the option of making a good content strategy for Facebook Ads or attracting traffic to your account from other social networks where you have a presence.