No one reads your Facebook page anymore… unless they pay!

Last spring, several managers were surprised to learn that on average only 16% posts made on a Facebook page made it to the page's fans' news feed.

In other words, even if you generate dynamic content that generates engagement from your community, Facebook's EdgeRank algorithm ensured that only a tiny fraction of your content made it to your fans' Timeline. I explained this phenomenon in this post entitled Why no one reads your Facebook page.
However, we learned this week that things are even worse since the 20 last September, as shown in this article (in English) dans Simply Zesty.

PUBLICATIONS LOSSING SPEED ON YOUR PAGE FACEBOOK

In fact, we are rather talking about a scope of publications oscillating between 5% et 20% and which depends on the size of your fanpage. According to an analysis by the firm Social Bakers, the more fans you have on your Facebook page, the more Facebook's EdgeRank algorithm will make your life harder, as evidenced by this study carried out between July 1 and 30 september 2012.

Average reach per post is inversely proportional to the size of your Facebook page
We see that as soon as your page reaches a critical threshold of more than 25,000 fans, It is 11% or fewer of your fans who will see your posts in their news feed on Facebook. And if you believe that this drop in performance is directly or indirectly linked to your publications which become less relevant or interesting, think again! According to this analysis from 3,000 Facebook pages by the EdgeRank checker blog, we notice a drastic and generalized drop as of 20 september 2012.

Variation in average range (at 20 september 2012)
The following statistics speak for themselves, when we compared the performance of these pages during the week before the 20 September vs. the following week:

• Drop in 25% within natural range (organic) publications on the Facebook pages analyzed;
• Drop in 45% in the natural virality of publications on the Facebook pages analyzed;
• Drop in 17% in the level of fan engagement on the pages analyzed.

WANTING BUTTER AND BUTTER MONEY

Since Facebook’s failed IPO, several changes have surfaced in recent months in order to seek more and more income, particularly on the business pages side. After traditional advertisements (Facebook Ads) and promoted links (sponsored posts), Facebook recently innovated with the introduction of its paid publications, called promoted posts. The concept is quite simple: for a given publication, you pay to guarantee that it will travel at least 75% fans of your page.
This “innovation” constitutes for me the beginning of the end of the good years of Facebook. I understand that the company must now respond to the dictates of shareholders and quarterly results, but in fact companies find themselves paying double for the privilege of speaking to their fans. On the one hand, many pay for ads on Facebook (Ads) to promote their page and thus build their community, at least in part. D’autre part, we change the situation in terms of the EdgeRank algorithm along the way, question of reducing the effectiveness of publications, reduce the scope and in doing so… impose a new option, le promoted post, to get the broadcast you previously got for free, assuming you know how to dynamically manage a Facebook page, i.e. concours, questions, videos, photos, etc.

ON THE IMPORTANCE OF FOCUSING ON YOUR OWN CONTENT PLATFORMS

These new surveys and analyzes in some way confirm the series of posts I wrote to you about on this blog during the month of September, particularly on the importance of having a content strategy but above all of focusing on what we call owned media, either the platforms over which you have control: blog, site internet, newsletter, etc. I invite you to read this post in particular, or this one.
However, I leave the final word to Sébastien Gonzalez who threw the first paving stone into the pond, last week on the etourisme.info site with its post You are on Facebook… but for how long? Please allow me to quote his conclusion here.:

(…) but a campsite manager, of a hotel or a guest room… what is the point for him to invest a significant communication budget so that his fans see his publications ? If it still generates business, an attractive return on investment, why not ! But if it’s just to get a few “likes”… I remain skeptical… (Sébastien Gonzalez)
However, I do not want to conclude with an apocalypse scenario by throwing the baby out with the bathwater.. Facebook remains an important player, even essential of social media, no matter the size of your business. It remains a potential generator of traffic to business sites, and a customer service tool, unrivaled marketing and even human resources to develop a strong brand image. However, make sure you have the basic tools for good web marketing 1.0 in place (at the information desk, transactional website, telephone exchange, etc.) and have a real social media strategy before launching on Facebook or investing considerable sums in it. Knowing that rules can (and go) change overnight, Forewarned is forearmed...

Souce http://fredericgonzalo.com/