How to Take Advantage of Facebook's New Algorithm

Facebook's Edgerank is evolving: There are now over 100,000 criteria that factor into what a fan sees on their Newsfeed on a daily basis. Details on such factors are hard to come by, but there is new insight on what goes into Facebook's latest algorithm/ranking system based off of a survey of current users.

To summarize, Facebook is making it easier to determine what content is higher quality -- and what is not. Now, digital marketers will need to keep an extra close eye on content that is trustworthy, pertinent and useful for the fan in order to stay at the top of a Newsfeed.

Here's how you can make sure your content stands out:

1. Create Quality Posts: Facebook is an incredibly intertwined community and therefore, the content pushed out to fans should help keep it feeling that way. As a result, the copy that goes along with a photo or link should be engaging and keep your audience wanting more. Does your company answer the following questions (as asked by Facebook)? Would you share it with friends or recommend it to others? Would you call this a low quality post or meme? Would you complain about seeing this content in your News Feed?
2. Concentrate on True Engagement: Before, asking fans to "Like" a post or "Share" a link typically got fans to engage. However, Facebook has now implemented rules around such requests of fans which may come with negative metric results. Therefore, be extra mindful of the content that you are posting, as it should organically get fans to engage -- and come back for more in the future.
3. Offer Various Types of Posts: If you didn't know, many Facebook Pages relied on image-heavy post to obtain great engagement in the past and thus, received more eyes on their content. Today, Facebook has made many changes to how other types of content is being seen. For example, they recently updated how links are displayed in the Newsfeed (FB increased the size of the image in the links), hence why marketers need to rethink the type of content that they are typically using. If your company only pushes images, you may be negatively effected by not reaching the majority of your fans who may prefer text-only or posts with links.

Lastly, there have been additional edits to Edgerank that may also effect if and how your content is being seen by fans on Facebook. Story Bumping, for instance, moves past posts to the top of a fan's Newsfeed if they did not see it before. Such stories are chosen based on who posted the content and the connection between said company/person and the fan at hand. For now, we've only seen it being used between fans, but this is evidence of the direction that Facebook is currently headed. As we've noted, Facebook is now providing fans with the posts that they find most useful or entertaining, versus a random Newsfeed of information.

Takeaway: Although we're thrilled that Facebook is making the necessary changes to make sure the content a fan sees is relevant and valuable, this makes it more difficult (but not impossible) for a marketer or company to be successful on this popular platform. Take the above tips into consideration and the Newsfeed will take notice!

-- Samantha & Mike

Where Sports Fans Engage on Social Media

Big sports fan? Ever talk about the game on FB or Twitter? You're certainly not alone.

Catalyst's annual fan engagement study studies sports fans to better determine where they play on social media -- and where marketers can better reach them! In Catalyst's recent study, the team surveyed 2,100 sports fans (16 and 64 years old) who follow the NFL, NBA, MLB, college football, college basketball and soccer.

A few top points are highlighted below, but check out the full infographic below

• Surprisingly, only 57% of fans surveyed "liked" a brand/sport team page to show their support -- versus 61% who "liked" a page for a coupon or discount.
• Although more fans are on Facebook in general, Twitter is the most popular platform on a game day.
• Post game, Instagram rises in popularity, when fans are most likely sharing images from the game or viewing party.

-- Samantha

Engagement Valued More Than Sales

For those who choose to venture into the social unknown, there are certain goals and expectations that must be established before seeing success. Although a true return on investment (ROI) has never been easy to measure, many other obtainable outcomes can be considered to help push a brand into the mainstream, including engagement. According to a 2013 survey of US marketing professionals done by Pivot Conference, the top goals of social media marketing (SMM) for brands included brand lift and consumer engagement. These numbers are up in comparison to last year, when positive sentiment ranked higher on the list. Having said that, many marketing professionals are beginning to understand that it's less about the positive reaction from fans and more about keeping consistent engagement numbers high with Likes, RTs and Sharing. The more a consumer interacts with a brand (whether positively, negatively or neutral), the more likely the brand will stay top of mind for them.

From the survey, the most interesting decrease lies with how marketers currently view the importance of sales. Although in past years this goal ranked highest, brands now understand that a direct relationship between SMM and sales is hard to quantify. As a result, companies must find different ways to reach their fan base that will guarantee such an activity will eventually lead them down the purchase funnel. Although round-about, many social media platforms demand engagement before sales.

Those brands that still place too high of an importance on sales may demonstrate that they don't fully understand how to amplify themselves successfully within the digital space and the online social media space in general.  No matter how you go about it, engagement and brand awareness are vital to keeping a brand's messaging above the clutter of mainstream marketing -- way before one can even begin shopping!

Overall, it's apparent that the social media industry is constantly evolving. Such an evolution has forced marketers to reevaluate their current strategies, especially to include more importance on brand awareness and lift. Although many of these newer social media marketing ideas go against the grain of traditional marketing, we're interested to see when SMM will be fully accepted and what impact it will have in future business and sales.

What are the top goals of social media for your business?

-- Samantha & Mike

The Most Engaged Brands on Twitter

You have heard it before and you will hear it again, an engaged brand is a successful brand. Out of all the social media options out there, Twitter has become one of the go-to platforms for customer engagement. Twitter is a fantastic channel for brands to create a conversation with their fans. Of course, a large number of fans and an increased tweet frequency has a lot to do with the success of a brand, but as we can see from the infographic created by Nestivity below, it is not a direct correlation. Having 10 million followers sounds like an impressive number, and it is, but if that following isn't engaged, it doesn't really mean anything. A few of the more interesting facts we gathered from this infographic are:

• More followers did not correlate into a more engaged brand
• A higher tweet frequency also did not correlate into a more engaged brand
• Tweets sent between 2pm and 5pm generated the most engagement
• 76% of shared tweets contained a photo

Remember, engagement is king. Take notes from the top brands on this list and try implementing similar tactics into your own Twitter campaign.

-Mike & Samantha