I was honored to have Andrea Vahl as a guest on the Marketing Blab. Co-author of Facebook Marketing All-in-One for Dummies, Andrea shared her insights and tips in response to the question is Facebook organic reach dead or alive?
Here’s what Andrea shared with the Blab viewers:
People are frustrated and irritated because the old days of free reach, fabulous comments and engagement are over. It’s more challenging now because Facebook is a publicly-traded company and, as such, they’re interested in having people pay for advertising a little bit more than they did in the past. I think Facebook works much better if you have a little bit of an ad budget.
However, Facebook organic reach is not completely dead. It’s still out there. You can still have posts do really well. Two elements to pay attention to are:
• What’s working well for you (watch your stats and look at your Facebook insights) and repeat.
• See what resonates best with your audience – what’s getting the most engagement – and repeat.
For instance, if you had a blog you posted that did really well, you might want to think about resharing it again that next week. If you shared something humorous, a video or a particular type of post that did well, then, do more of that and get your audience connected.
Is Your Reach Insane or Has It Tanked?
Andrea continued to explain that for a lot of niche businesses, like B2B, organic reach can be more challenging. If you have a wider-consumed product, you could have reach that isn’t bad a lot of the time. For instance, “I see some mom blogger sites where I’ve looked at their insights and their organic reach is insane – it’s still going gangbusters! Now, it’s not where it used to be, but it’s still there, they’re still getting it and it’s still valuable. I think it’s a little bit dependent on your niche.”
If you’re in a place where your organic reach has totally tanked, you have to think of different things you can possibly do. Andrea suggests you really take a deep dive into your analytics to see where things are resonating with your audience and see if you can tweak some of your sharing strategies.
What’s More Important Engagement or Reach?
“I think there is such a thing as organic reach,” Andrea said. However, she continued to explain that reach is something you can’t control. What you can control are the types of things you’re sharing – things that are interesting to your audience. So pay attention to that.
One of the things I like to look at is the engagement rate in your insights. When you’re in the Insights area, go to Posts and then, rather than looking at your overall reach, switch the view to Engagement Rate. That’s where you’ll see how engaging your posts are to the people who see them. It’s a better comparison because you’re comparing the real true engagement.
It’s not your fault that Facebook didn’t push out your post(s) a little bit further. Obviously posts that are more engaging in general get a little bit more organic reach, but sometimes it’s just kind of a weird thing that’s out of your control. You want to see what’s engaging to your audience of people who do see it!
Look at your engagement rate and see how it’s comparing. “Likes,” comments and shares are not the top metric to watch. The ultimate goal is to be getting people over to your web site and signing up to your email list. That’s my top goal, it may not be your top goal, but as a marketer and as a business it’s important. It’s my top gal because when I capture emails, those subscribers are mine – I’m not dependent on reach and other elements. Email is still one of the best ways to reach people.
Should You Use Humor When Posting on Facebook?
Humor does really well. I think it’s important to keep humor as part of your strategy on social media because that’s what people are hanging out there to do. Even if your brand is more serious, there are ways you can add humor in. You don’t want to be a total stick-in-the-mud or stiff person. I think every business could use humor in some ways to help their reach.
The question becomes “what does that really do for my business?” It’s really about getting in front of people and being top of mind with them. You wouldn’t want to have all your posts be humorous, but it’s one of the tools that should be in your toolbox for sure.
When it comes to Facebook organic reach, what tools are in your marketing toolbox? Share your thoughts in the comment section below because I’d love to hear from you. Thanks a million.
Watch the complete interview with Andrea on the Marketing Blab below:
Special thanks to Andrea Vahl for sharing her Facebook wisdom. You can find Andrea at http://andreavahl.com and of course, on Facebook!
