Adapting To The Many Changes Of Facebook

Social media is constantly evolving. So much so that it can be hard for businesses to keep up. What was once primarily used to connect with loved ones and form new friendships has morphed into a platform that businesses use to expand their reach. This is accomplished through both paid and organic content. Paid content is content shared with spend behind it to help reach a larger audience. Organic content is posted for free.?

With many businesses relying on social media to grow their customer base it’s important to be aware of changes that occur on social media platforms. That way paid and organic social media marketing plans can be adapted accordingly. Especially since a presence on social media can make or break your business.

Facebook – A Marketing Giant

With Facebook being one of the largest social media marketing platforms, businesses have a lot to keep up with if they want to fully utilize all the options Facebook has to offer. This year Facebook has gone through several changes and even experienced some troubling times.

Due to Apple’s recent privacy updates, advertisers are now unable to track iPhone users without their consent. This has digital ad companies, including Facebook, on edge. Facebook’s ad business comes from direct response advertising. Essentially, ad sellers and buyers use data from information gathered from consumers including what they are searching for to place ads right in front of their intended audience to quickly generate sales. This may significantly impact how businesses use ads on Facebook. For example, as more and more people opt-out of tracking on iOS 14 devices, the size of app connections, custom audience, and website custom audiences may decrease. In response, companies will likely have to use a broad audience for inclusion and implement target expansion.

In recent months Facebook has also implemented several changes of their own including launching Facebook Reels in the US, changing the way user accounts are counted, and updating pre-campaign estimates for Facebook ads.

With various changes taking place on a platform that has been a staple piece of many businesses' social media marketing plans, it’s natural to question whether that will continue to be true. As time goes on and even more changes occur you must know how to keep your business relevant in the realm of social media.

How to Remain Relevant as Platforms Shift

Remaining flexible with your social media marketing plan is what will keep your business afloat as social media platforms continue to change. There are several ways to ensure that your businesses’ social strategy is not just solid, but that it’s also able to change with the times. Following the best practices below will keep your social media pages relevant to your audience at all times.

?Leverage Quality over Quantity

No matter what changes occur in the realm of social media, high-quality content will still be attractive to social media users. In both paid and organic content use high-quality images, lighting, engaging captions, and if possible, brand ambassador personalities to broaden your reach. Most businesses will get caught up in the number of times they post on social media in a given week, but that doesn’t mean much if the quality is lacking. Viewers will not be engaged in what your business is saying if it doesn’t grab their attention.

As you build trusted followers in your online community and continue to deliver quality content, you’ll see an increase in people viewing, sharing and liking your posts. As this occurs more often the influence of your business on social media will grow. For example, Facebook uses meaningful as an important signal that a certain post should be prioritized. Essentially, social media posts with more thoughtful and meaningful interactions will get more reach. This increased engagement on social posts won’t just build your brand, it’ll drive traffic back to your site and likely grow your customer base.

Diversify your content

Let’s face it. No one wants to see the same post on social media over and over again. That’s one of the easiest ways to drive away the audience your business is trying to attract. Instead, post a wide variety of organic content on each social media platform that your business has a presence on to continually pique the interest of your audience.

To ensure you’re posting fresh content it’s a good idea to complete a content audit to get a comprehensive idea of what you’ve already produced. Completing an audit of your social media platforms will help you organize your content and measure which content is most successful on each platform. For example, for your business you may find that videos perform better on Facebook, while high quality images perform better on Instagram. From that finding you can switch up your content strategy going forward and post more videos on Facebook and switch out videos on Instagram with high quality images.

?Knowing what to post and where to post it is what will help you diversify your organic content on social media.

Follow the latest content trends

Keeping up with the latest and greatest trends on social media will show your audience that you can easily adapt to fit current practices. This can be a fun step for a business to take to spice up their social media content. For example, in October 2021 the red flag trend hit social media. Originally the trend began as people began to tweet red flags they look for in a relationship, but many businesses hopped on the trend as well including Twitter.

While content trends may be short lived, they are a great inexpensive way to get your business name out to the masses. Just think, people are already invested in the content and/or hashtag, so it’s an easy way to bring traffic to your business’s social pages with minimal effort and at no cost. However, since content trends do change frequently it’s important to spend time on social media daily, regularly monitor trending hashtags, and keep an eye on what competitors are doing. This will keep you in the loop when it comes to rapid changes on social platforms.

?Implement social media branding

Having a unique brand position on social media is what will help set you apart from the competition. This is especially important with paid content. It will also allow you to remain flexible when it comes to organic content that your business posts.

Social media branding makes it easy for you to get more relevant with your audience and can help bring in sales along the way. Before establishing your brand on social media there are a few things you should identify including your brand identity, target audience, content needs, and your brand’s style guide. Identifying these important aspects first will keep your content on brand no matter what type of content you share. That way, as updates occur to social platforms and you adapt your strategy to match those changes you can be sure that your audience will still connect with your content.

?For example, in October 2021 Facebook added Facebook Reels. Businesses and creators now have access to this feature to expand their reach on the platform. If your brand has a solid social media branding strategy in place, then creating content to adapt to this update will be much easier.

Don’t stick to one platform

We’ve all heard the saying “don’t put all your eggs in one basket”. In the case of social media marketing this statement rings true. While your business does not need to be on every social platform, it’s a good idea to have a presence on a couple. Two of the best social media platforms for businesses are Instagram and Facebook. The good thing about these two platforms is that Instagram was founded by Facebook, so the user experience is relatively similar. Facebook is the world’s largest social media platform and is highly preferred by businesses because of its targeted digital advertising platform. Instagram on the other hand is the best platform for businesses to showcase their products and interact with potential customers in real time.

?Posting paid and organic content on multiple platforms will benefit your business in more ways than one. Businesses that establish a presence on multiple social platforms can improve search engine rankings, provide a better customer experience, reach a wider audience, and keep up with competitors.

If you are looking for ways to easily manage multiple social media accounts, there are plenty of options to choose from. Here’s a full list of platforms your business can utilize or visit our website www.diacreative.com we can help you manage and grow your social media platforms!

Overall, overcoming the rapid changes that occur on social media platforms lies in the flexibility and debt of your social media marketing plan and content strategy. Making sure your business has a solid plan will keep you ahead of the game.?