Does Facebook’s Latest Change Mean Death for All Business Pages?

Allison Chaney

Jan 17 2018

Many marketers woke up January 11th to an inbox full of notices about Facebook’s latest change and maybe even a few panic emails from clients who thought their business would now go under because Facebook would no longer show their posts. First, come down off the ledge. There’s nothing to panic about. For most, it’s business as usual and the changes won’t affect much.

What do the changes really mean? Should I panic?

So what was the big change anyway? Facebook’s statement was that “we’ll be making updates to ranking so people have more opportunities to interact with the people they care about.” The key word here is “people.” Not businesses, not Pages. People. Facebook wants more conversation and interaction and will “prioritize posts that spark conversations and meaningful interactions between people.”

What does this mean for businesses?

This caused a mass panic among marketers as the assumption is that this will lead to a reduction in organic views for businesses.

This change really isn’t that big for many businesses, though. It’s been a long time since businesses saw any significant organic visibility to their posts. After all, only about 1% of a page’s fans sees their posts organically. So businesses have been paying to boost their content in front of audiences for some time now.

This is actually a good thing for users. By reducing the visibility of posts that generally don’t get any engagement (reactions, comments, or shares), this de-clutters the feed a bit. I’m sure there are plenty of Facebook users who will welcome that change and perhaps even use it more.

So what should you do if you have a Facebook business page?

• Create content that starts a conversation. Facebook stated that “Pages whose posts prompt conversations between friends will see less of an effect.”
• Post live video. Facebook noted that live video gets six times the interactions of other posts. And for now, they are still promoting it for you for free; when you go live, they notify your fans.
• Develop paid ads and boosted posts. This is not an expense. You are investing in your success and when done right, your investment will return great results.

What should you stop doing?

• Stop freaking out. Stay the course. If you are creating great content that gets engagement then it’s business as usual.
• Stop being boring. If you don’t get reactions or comments or shares of your posts, stop posting that type of content.
• Stop posting click-bait or engagement bait. You know who you are. Just stop it. This could hurt the long term credibility of your page so you should stop now.

The key takeaway here is to create great content that people want to see. Facebook has all of those great signals that tell you if people literally “like” what you’re posting so pay attention. And if you follow this golden rule, and avoid schemes and shady tactics, you will weather the storm of changes for years to come.

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