PDA

View Full Version : Facebook to change algorythms to force brands to buy ads in 2015



Harold Mansfield
11-21-2014, 01:31 PM
Can't say we didn't all see this coming. They've already reduced the reach of your company page by like 90%, now they're going to put the final nail in the coffin.
As I've been saying for at least 2 years now, your website should be the core of your online marketing, not 3rd party sites that you have no control over.


The change will be large enough that research firm Forrester is encouraging (http://blogs.forrester.com/nate_elliott/14-11-17-facebook_has_finally_killed_organic_reach_what_sho uld_marketers_do_next) companies to decrease their reliance on Facebook. Instead, the site recommends they add social relationship tools to their own sites and use email marketing campaigns to reach customers.
Source: Facebook's New Algorithm Could Force Brands to Buy Ads | Adweek (http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/facebook-brands-no-more-free-rides-161587)

vangogh
11-22-2014, 06:18 PM
Not surprising at all. This is why you should have a websites and not view Facebook as the only place to be online. Facebook can clearly drive a lot of traffic, but it should be seen as one among many marketing channels. I think you and I agree completely about this.

Here's a good article from CopyBlogger about digital sharecropping. Here's a quote from the article. The emphasis is mine.


The secret is to spend most of your time and creative energy building assets that you control.

There are three assets you should be building today, and should continue to focus on for the lifetime of your business:

1. A well-designed website with your own hosting account
2. An opt-in email list, ideally with a high-quality autoresponder
3. A reputation for providing impeccable value


The key is the part I emphasized. "That you control."

If there's something in your business, you don't control, you should plan for it changing at some point, and likely in a way detrimental to your business.

billbenson
11-22-2014, 08:07 PM
If you cut over a Facebook page that has been around for years and has hundreds or thousands of posts to a blog or website using old posts from Facebook, will you run into duplicate post issues (boy is this a long sentence)?

JonV6
11-25-2014, 11:38 AM
Not surprised at all about this. I've said to plenty of people before that it was only a matter of time until this happens. Marketers have had it too good for too long on Facebook. Whereas could you advertise to such an engaged and focus audience for absolutely nothing? Nowhere. It's just something we have to accept.

FlyingKite
11-26-2014, 05:04 AM
It was only a matter of time before they did this. Facebook needs a heck of a lot of income to justify it's $200 billion value. I feel sorry for small businesses that have relied solely on facebook for their advertising. Although I'm quite happy for larger corporations to pay for the ads! Someone's got to pay for facebook eh?

Tradepage.co
12-17-2014, 03:32 PM
It is somewhat disappointing that Facebook are continually squeezing the potential reach of a business page's paid advertising campaign. Upon observation, Facebook's implemented algorithms do seem to offer less reward to business at an ever increasing price. In many circumstances this appears to be shifting business interaction and behaviour unfavourably. For instance, the 20% text rule on ad images, in many ways negates the flier concept, where creative text design is a restrictive medium. Furthermore, it has always seemed perplexing that liking a page alone could not guarantee that a post will be seen by the user (without 'boosting' it further of course). Surely, this should always be the customers choice.

Back on to the subject at hand, we also found the introduction of competitor tracking to be an effective tool at encouraging responsive advertising, whilst also reducing a window of opportunity in saturated markets.

In short though, they quite simply hold an overly significant share of the social media market, where our potential customers are locked into their service by the content they continually submit. As many other market sectors have historically demonstrated, when there is a lack of competition, a leader could look to take advantage. Therefore, in this instance, as the service is free to use, it is business based users that are taking the hit in their advertising efforts (apparently most notably SMEs where budgets are often more restrictive). Until a well designed service provider can offer a genuinely strong alternative, it is anticipated that this issue will likely continue to escalate.

MikeyBW
12-22-2014, 11:23 AM
This was always going to happen. In all honesty I'm surprised about how sore most people's reactions have been. Where else did you have a marketing channel that cost absolutely nothing and allowed you unlimited advertising space and time to a relevant and targeted audience! I think everyone should stop complaining about what we've lost and instead think about how lucky we were.

vangogh
12-24-2014, 06:51 PM
Thought I'd highlight what Harold said in his first post in the thread.


your website should be the core of your online marketing, not 3rd party sites that you have no control over

There's nothing wrong with taking advantage of marketing opportunities on 3rd party sites, but you have to have a home base that's under your control. Most marketing on 3rd party sites should be driving traffic back to your site. People seem to get carried away with social sites to the point where their entire business relies on the 3rd party site. If you rely on something 100% then it 100% of your business can be taken away.

turkeysub
02-07-2015, 07:57 PM
It's basically impossible to grow organically and advertise freely on facebook anymore. They must be rolling in money from ads

DigiWizi
02-23-2015, 10:29 PM
I'll say this though, I don't think this is maintainable. Eventually they will find that they need to allow for some at least minor organic posts to leak through. Otherwise only a small percentage of users will bother making pages, the pages will begin to dwindle, people will have little to share and they will find a new social outlet. Facebook could literally be destroyed by taking the reach away 100% from an organic standpoint. Not in the first 6 months but definitely within a year or two of it.

MKarp
02-24-2015, 05:05 PM
Definitely saw this coming. And the point about controlling your own assets is 100% right.

But it's not necessarily a new idea. Copyblogger has been shouting this to the heavens for years telling people why it's so important. Of course, it can certainly be new to a lot of people. We can only hope that they heed the warning.

I think most brands are promoting their page and buying ads anyway, so for them this won't make that big of a difference. But for smaller brands hoping to build their audience organically until they have the capital to invest, I'm sure they're not too happy.

MyFreeWebSiteNow
03-02-2015, 07:30 AM
Advertising for likes on Facebook has become a waste of late. Its good for some social proof but that social proof looks very hollow if there is no engagement on your page, which Facebook essentially now forces you to pay for.

Harold Mansfield
03-02-2015, 09:42 AM
I'll say this though, I don't think this is maintainable. Eventually they will find that they need to allow for some at least minor organic posts to leak through. Otherwise only a small percentage of users will bother making pages, the pages will begin to dwindle, people will have little to share and they will find a new social outlet. Facebook could literally be destroyed by taking the reach away 100% from an organic standpoint. Not in the first 6 months but definitely within a year or two of it.

If just judging by my own business...I used to get a lot of work creating Custom Facebook pages with custom tabs. People saw it as a must have. Today, I haven't done one since last summer. Everyone knows that things have changed. No one really cares, asks, or sees it as a necessity anymore. Only the die hards that plan on running promotions specifically on Facebook (which means they've committed to spending on Facebook) are still doing custom pages. And that's about it.

As a free source of promotion, it's pretty much dead. But as an overall paid medium for advertising and promotion it's still one of the best. You can still drop some money on an ad in Facebook and start driving traffic to whatever your thing is almost immediately.

tallen
03-02-2015, 11:27 AM
In my experience, they have not killed 100% any organic distribution of business page posts -- you can still get some organic reach, but as always you have to have really engaging content.

likeaboss
06-01-2015, 03:34 PM
That's a valid point. Seems the pendulum will keep swinging until a happy medium is found or until people move on to the next avenue.