We examine what Facebook’s News Feed Updates might mean for publishers’ engagement rates.Â
As you’ve probably heard by now, Facebook this week announced some changes to the type of content that will be given preference in the News Feed in future.
In a post titled ‘News Feed FYI: Balancing Content from Friends and Pages‘ Product Manager Max Eulenstein and UX Researcher Lauren Scissors announced a trio of updates to the make-up of the feed.
Here’s what’s happening:
- The News Feed will show more content from the same sources if the user ‘runs out’. So some people will be seeing more posts from the same source.
- Content posted directly by friends will be higher up in News Feed so you are less likely to miss it.
- Stories from pages that you don’t directly like (that pop into your feed when a friend likes or comments on them) will appear ‘lower down in News Feed or not at all’.
Here are three ways we see the changes affecting publishers on Facebook.
1) Publishers will Need to Analyse Their Engagements Breakdowns
Recently, we looked at the different types of Facebook interactions that different types of content are likely to attract.
Here are the types of stories that we found tend to get a lot of Likes and Comments on Facebook:
Following on from this week’s announcement, publishers should take the time to dig through their Facebook engagement data (our Insights data tool is very useful here) to try and figure out what the ratio is on your content.
Many will already see that the Like:Click ratio is pretty low. A Like is often an acknowledgement, with no further action being taken by the reader. It should be possible to cross-reference your engagement data with actual clicks, and to see what content forms and subjects work on your site.
If you’re finding that you’re overly reliant on Likes to bring in engagement, and that you’re not seeing page fan numbers grow in tandem, you might want to think about how to get those passing eyeballs to subscribe for more.
It’s very important to emphasis that these changes don’t mean that Likes and Comments are no longer important. In fact, their role could now be pronounced, with Facebook explaining that “If you like to read news or interact with posts from pages you care about, you will still see that content in News Feed”. So keeping existing subscribers engaged is as important as ever – and Likes remain the easiest way of doing this.
2) An Emphasis on the Share
Facebook mentioned in their update that “in some cases, post reach and referral traffic could potentially decline” for publishers. This makes a lot of sense – publishers will now be seeing less of the engagements that they received from friends of fans.
However, shares weren’t included. Getting people to directly share your content with their friends remains the strongest indication of engagement, and that’s now truer than ever.
This means that treating Facebook as an alternative homepage is important for publishers. Content works different on Facebook than it does on a website, and adopting a natural tone and identifying the forms that work helps your chances.
Check out our tips for boosting shares for more.
3) Getting Readers to Subscribe to Your Page(s) Becomes Important
Now that you’ll be getting less people clicking through when a story pops into their feed via a friend’s engagement, having people subscribe to your page in the first place is of increased importance.
This is good news for publishers with fans who like less pages – their posts are going to have less competition for news feed real estate, and more exposure to subscribers that regularly use Facebook.
Reminding readers to like your page on your site, in email, or through other channels may become more of a priority for publishers.
This has another effect in terms of audience segmentation. If you’re publishing a wide variety of content, and pushing it all out on your main Facebook page, you’re likely serving many readers with content that they have little interest in. One of the best ways of fixing that is by maintaining different pages for different content verticals, while still making sure that they offer a quality stream of content to readers.
Finally, Facebook themselves advise a number of approaches for publishers looking to drive referrals. They include: posting frequently, sharing a wide variety of content, using Open Graph and App Link tags, and more.
We’ll be watching how the updates affects content engagements on the NewsWhip blog, so be sure to subscribe for our latest posts.
Sign up for a free Spike trial and find the stories that your audience will love.Â
