Organic reach for businesses on Facebook is on life support since the company changed its platform’s algorithm to prioritize feeds from family and friends over posts from businesses, brands and media. You only have to look at your Reach and Page View stats to see the damage done to your organic posts.
A recent article at Medium.com by WordStream founder Larry Kim highlights five ways you can (legally) “hack” the Facebook algorithm to increase organic engagement rates:
- News feed targeting.
News feed targeting is new and works just like ad targeting (where you can customize your audience) except that it’s free! To increase your organic post reach, you want your posts to get to the people who would be most interested in seeing them.
You can narrow your target by the subject of your post to reach those you really want without bothering other followers who would likely not be interested in the subject of your post that day.
- Separate content unicorns from donkeys.
Content unicorns are those posts that get a ton of engagement, and will typically be only about two percent of your posts. Content donkeys are fine; they just don’t stand out that much and get average engagement.
To get better engagement on Facebook, you need to post unicorns — which means posting fewer but better pieces of content. To ascertain which of your posts are unicorns, you will need to do some sorting with the help of your followers outside Facebook. Share lots of content on LinkedIn, Twitter, your email newsletter, etc. Then post only the most engaging content on Facebook.
- Boost your posts.
Facebook gives you the opportunity to spend a little money to boost your posts with their Boost Posts feature. You can spend as little as $20 to boost a popular post and get an impressive number of organic engagements as a result.
- Add engaged followers.
Facebook gives you the opportunity to invite people who have engaged with one of your posts to like your page by inviting them to do so. Simply click on the names of people who liked your post and you will see two options next to their names: Invite or Liked. Click on “Invite” and Facebook sends an invitation to that person to like your page.
- Use video.
Adding video to your marketing mix can really boost your organic engagement, since people tend to watch and share videos more than static content.
