The New Facebook Algorithm: what it means for your upcoming brand
Originally published at linkedin.com on January 19, 2018.
Last Thursday, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg announced major changes that struck panic among many publishers. Reason being, it seemed like a direct contradiction to the relationship with publishers that the platform sought to have before, relying heavily on video.
The first changes you’ll see will be in News Feed, where you can expect to see more from your friends, family and groups. As we roll this out, you’ll see less public content like posts from businesses, brands, and media. And the public content you see more will be held to the same standard — it should encourage meaningful interactions between people. -Mark Zuckerberg
So why the sudden change for Facebook’s prized feature? Business Insider claims that Zuckerberg has drastically changed his way of thinking since becoming a father, and that is reflective on the platform’s latest update.
From the video, we see the emphasis on bringing back Facebook as the social network. Whereas publishers largely benefited on Facebook’s need for content in 2013 (supply & demand!), Facebook is now turning its 2.01 billion-user back to publishers.
Person-to-person will be more valuable than person-to-page [in ranking your News Feed’s content].
Zuckerberg, however, knows that this tactic will reduce time spent on his app. “Now, I want to be clear: by making these changes, I expect the time people spend on Facebook and some measures of engagement will go down,” said Zuck, “but I also expect the time you do spend on Facebook will be more valuable.”
So will a News Feed prioritizing connections’ updates lead to the demise of publishers?
Meaningful Interactions vs Passive Consumption
Facebook’s Head of News Feed, Adam Mosseri, tweeted that this update is a “refocus on meaningful interactions between people.” It enforces the idea that likes and comments (what some have come to call “engagement”) are not the core goal of your posts, but rather just a metric. Jason Abbruzzese (business editor for Mashable) then asked what was considered a “meaningful interaction.”
As Mashable tech reporter Kerry Flynn notes, the initial Facebook charm is over. “Now users scroll mindlessly on News Feed, where Facebook’s mysterious algorithms randomly selects what videos to show, among other #content. Facebook now calls this ‘passive’ consumption, and they want to move away from it.”
To this point, Facebook wants more people interacting beyond the usual mentioning of friends in the comment sections. Per Adam’s note, it seems they are heavily relying on the platform generating discussion and counting that as effective engagement. So how is betting on discussion/threads going to affect brands and publishers?
“Think of the brands and publishers, please!”
If brands and publishers want to adapt to the algorithm update (which many attempt to do with every update from the FB Newsroom), it seems that now more than ever they have to create shareable content. In response to algorithm changes in 2017, with video being prioritized for Facebook’s algorithm, many publishers “hacked” their reach by uploading static photos as videos. Facebook’s algorithm, giving preference to videos, then ultimately extended the post’s reach. But it seems that Facebook has become aware of it, thus focusing more on meaningful interactions.
“The importance of user-generated content, which has already been proven to be the №1 driver of social influence on purchase decisions, is greater than ever if posts from friends and family are going to be prioritized above all else,” Katherine Hays (CEO of Vivoom) said to Adweek’s Josh Sternberg.
Don’t worry, you will still see content from Pages, but you will have to heavily rely on friends to share that content. Chances are that you will stop seeing posts of “ Samantha commented on this photo” as often as you do today.
“It should be the final kiss of death for those pivoting to video betting on getting video views via Facebook.” -Raju Narisetti, CEO of Gizmodo Media Group ( for Adweek)
So what can my company do?
Adweek’s David Cohen captured the reaction of many in the ad industry on the news feed update. When asked what was the best advice for brands this upcoming year, Mari Smith, a small business and Facebook marketing expert, had great pointers.
Her advice, directed mostly at page administrators, included a stronger call-to-action for brands to direct fans to the “See First” feature. The feature allows your favorite content to be placed at the beginning of your news feed, proudly presented by a star in the top right corner.
Another piece of advice was to “use Facebook Live more often: Facebook said Live videos are totaling six times the interactions of non-Live videos.” When strategizing on what type of content to push, always look to what tools Facebook wants you to use. They will prioritize this as they push for more creators to use the tools. Remember Facebook’s Canvas? Many of the ads that I saw in 2016 were Canvas — and they got me clicking.
The Facebook group community has also been immensely growing. Smith says to “use groups more often. Facebook is really building out groups. It’s almost building a new News Feed, a separate Facebook-[are] groups the next Facebook?” This is similar to how you can customize your feed on Twitter by using Lists and seeing content based on different topics.
Finally, businesses should use Facebook’s tools if that’s their main platform for reach. One of them is the Facebook Local app, which helps them appear in the map where many users can visit and recommend the place.
With the changes Facebook is implementing, publishers will have yet another hurdle to reaching their audiences. But it is that sentiment that is put into perspective: do you have followers or an audience? Successful storytellers and those that best connect to their readers will succeed in 2018 on Facebook’s platform.
Got any thoughts to add? Tweet me @juliangumbo or comment below!
Julian Gamboa is a UC Berkeley graduate with a focus on marketing. Julian was selected as a LinkedIn Top Voice for Marketing and #Social Media (2017) and a Course Instructor of the marketing and digital publishing course Digital Marketing Today at the Haas School of Business. He is also the founder of Digiviewpoint, a millennial publishing account.
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