Have you noticed your Facebook views per post declining? Does it feel like you’re getting only a smaller proportion of the reach that you used to? Chances are, it’s not the way you’re posting or even the content you’re posting. Rather, it’s Facebook cutting down on the reach of pages through tweaks to their Edge Rankings to make it more difficult to get organic reach. This “coincidentally” coincides with the increasing presence of the “Boost Your Post” pop-ups and notifications.
Why Boost Your Post?
Of course, there certainly is no denying that boosting your post on Facebook will gain you more reach and thus, a bigger audience. You’d be surprised at how many people aren’t even seeing your posts until your run a boosted post campaign. That means that there really are sometimes that you should boost your post on Facebook.
– New product or service release – Important updates to policy – Big sales or special promotions – A post that you’re certain will go viral – Any news releases or clips that make you look amazing
Essentially, when you’re getting excited about posting something, you should consider boosting the post-even by just a few dollars so that other people can get excited too. Of course, much like Pay-Per-Click ads on AdWords, this will only get you a short-term gain unless you have a larger system or network in place that will keep your audience’s attention once they click on your post’s CTA. Boosting every post is just going to cost you a lot of money.
Alternatives to Boosting Facebook Posts
Of course, this means that you’re going to have to find other ways to make your Facebook posts more visible to increase your reach. Luckily, there are a few tips and tricks that social media experts employ to increase your reach and get your message out there to more of your fans.
– Put previously shared links in comments. One of the biggest changes I’ve noticed to the Edge Rank algorithms Facebook uses is that sharing the same link over and over again will really cut your reach down drastically. This is bad news for those that are trying to draw attention to a landing page as the more you post it, the lower the reach gets. When you boost these posts, it will show on the top of newsfeeds, but to get around it, simply make a post with some media, and then throw the call to action link in the first comment. This doesn’t count against your Rank, so your post will receive no penalty for the re-shared link. – Create events, but share in comments. Similarly to shared links, all of your events should be shared in the comments section. Facebook has made event making garbage otherwise. – Post interesting content. Of course, we’re not saying that you aren’t already, but post things that garner more attention naturally. Text really doesn’t, but pictures and videos are sure to do the trick. Remember, not every picture or video has to be directly about you, but can be indirectly about your product, service or idea as well. For instance, a restaurant might post a link to their favorite recipe every once in a while, but will really do well with pictures of their food dishes. – Hashtags. If you aren’t already using Facebook hashtags, start using them now. They work just like Twitter hashtags, so make the most of them.
