Have you been posting about your new products on Facebook lately? Have you been urging your fans to purchase the items you’ve put on sale? I guess we all have…. Today, I bring some news about the changes from Facebook and my ultimate workaround tips!
Two weeks ago, Facebook announced through a blog post a major change in how they will show posts from business pages in the news feed. Their blog title says it all: “Reducing Overly Promotional Page Posts in News Feed.
So you might ask, what are “overly promotional page posts”? Good question!
Facebook shared that they did a survey to better understand how they feel about their news feed content. The answers, according to the social media giant, were that they wanted to see more stories from friends and Pages they care about, and less promotional content.
The type of posts that makes the cut for overly promotional are…
- Posts that solely push people to buy a product or install an app.
- Posts that push people to enter promotions and sweepstakes with no real context.
- Posts that reuse the exact same content from ads.
To make it easier for us to understand these types better, Facebook posted two examples:
So what is Facebook REALLY doing? Fewer Promotional Page Posts.
According to Facebook, they will be decreasing the organic distribution of overly promotional page posts in news feeds starting next year.
“Beginning in January 2015, people will see less of this type of content in their News Feeds… All of this means that pages that post promotional creative should expect their organic distribution to fall significantly over time.”
They also added a tip as to how Facebook Business Pages can continue utilising the network for sales and conversion – make ALL your posts, including the promotional ones – valuable.
“The idea is to increase the relevance and quality of the overall stories – including page posts – people see in their News Feeds. This change is about giving people the best Facebook experience possible and being responsive to what they have told us.”
How do we make our posts ‘valuable’?
When you promote your products on Facebook, make sure you always answer this question: ‘what’s it in for your audience?!’
For service providers…
When you promote your service, don’t just post a photo and ask them to take advantage of your offer, make the post engaging and valuable by…
- Adding in tips that will help them make the first step in solving their problem
- Informing them how you can help them
- Giving a preview of the many lessons you will impart to them.
Always make sure you give them a piece of the pie or even two, so it’s not “overly promoting”.
For retailers….
More often than not, it’s always the retail page posts that fall into the “overly promoting” scheme. To avoid this, make sure that you…
- Give a short background on how your product can help make their lives easier
- Tell them something they don’t know about your product – other applications, history, useful tips on how to use it efficiently, etc.
Remember, you must provide them information that will be of value to them.
I’d like to recall the simple formula I always tell my client on how to keep your fans engaged and happy: Follow the “3 E’s” – Engage, Entertain, Educate. When you incorporate these in EVERY post you make, you’re sure to know that it is “overly promotional”.
What other ways can you promote your products now that Facebook is making things a little more difficult?
Sure there are more ways to keep promoting your products without getting banned by Facebook. Here are our suggestions:
- Utilise your email campaigns! Email Marketing is still the highest converting marketing strategy (better than all social media marketing combined), so why not invest in that? With emails, you get to decide how you do it. You’re the boss!
- Use landing pages for promotions. When you badly need to do a promotion post, host it on a landing page and post this page on your
- Facebook. With only one post to promote, it will become easier for you to make it valuable instead of overly promoting. Add spice to your caption by using the tips we mentioned above!
- Use other social media networks. Facebook is currently the biggest out there, but this doesn’t mean you won’t get traction when you promote in the other networks. So go ahead… use Pinterest, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram and see how helpful it could be to you too! To succeed in Instagram Marketing, read this post we made.
By now, we should all be immune with how Facebook quickly changes the rules. We can expect more changes next year… but remember, when you do quality posts, there isn’t anything to be worried about. We hope you now better understand the latest changes and do the tips we mentioned above.
Have you been doing overly promotional posts lately? How do you plan to change the way you post to abide by the changes in Facebook? Let me know in the comments below!