ELI5 4 B2B: Social Media Algorithms

When you see a social media post go viral, you might think to yourself, "I don't want to be an influencer, but I'd sure love to have the free publicity for my company/product/brand!". Even if you're a reluctant social media user it can be helpful to have a basic understanding of how social media algorithms work. You may never go viral, but understanding what factors go into social media virality can help you make the most of social media for you and for your company.

NOTE: Since our audience here is people who work in B2B businesses, this article focuses on LinkedIn. The information is general enough however that it will apply to any social network algorithm to some extent.

Always remember, the goal of a social network is to keep you on it. Ads seen > Ads clicked > profit. No ads seen, no ads clicked, no profit. Everything in the algorithm is designed to keep you scrolling & interacting as long as possible.

Terminology: Network Size

If you've used LinkedIn for any length of time, you have seen accounts listed as 1st, 2nd, and 3rd+ connections. This is the number of 'hops' between you. 1st connections are direct, 2nd have one person in between, etc.

Other social networks have similar concepts, even if they don't make it explicit. When we talk about 'network size' in this article we're mostly talking about 1st-level/direct connections. It's a little more complicated than that, but the details aren't meaningful to most people.

What happens when you make a social media post?

When you post on a social network, it will show up in the feed of "some" of your network. The definition of "some" is the focus of this article. The term used to define "some" in a social network is "Reach". What follows are the factors that influence Reach, and ways you can increase it. Reach has two aspects; initial Reach, defined as the number of accounts your post is shown to by default, and Boost, which is the ability of your post to reach more accounts over time, based on how other accounts interact with it.

Factors That Influence Initial Post Reach

The size of your network is a major factor in how many people your post Reaches. A bigger network means more reach when you post. The way to grow your network is to request to connect with people, or accept their connection requests. Here are the three categories of connections that your post will reach:

1. Your 'close contacts'. These are accounts with which you engage most frequently. Note that an account with a large number of followers but doesn't engage much may have a smaller initial reach than a more active account with fewer followers. This is also an argument for being selective about who you connect with. Connections that don't engage with your posts add very little value (and a lot of times their connection request was just an attempt to sell you something).
2. "Recent" connections. Anyone you have connected with recently will typically see your posts until the algorithm can determine if it is a close contact. Note that when you connect with someone you'll also see recent posts from before you connected in your feed, and you in theirs.
3. Your post will also be added to a small but random set of your less frequent engagers. This is actually the only truly random part of a social network algorithm.

There are also factors that affect initial reach by adding a bonus or penalty:

Bonuses

• If the post uses a 'new' format type for that network, you'll get additional reach. Examples of 'new' format types are Stories on Facebook, or Video & Newsletters on LinkedIn. Since the company behind the social network believes these formats will help them increase the amount of time you spend on them, they artificially increase Reach for those types of posts.
• Tagging others. Your post will be shared to a subset of the network of anyone you tag. The size of the subset will be larger depending on how close the connection is.

Penalties

• Posts from brand pages automatically get a Reach penalty. Social networks figure companies can/will pay to increase reach. You may have come across offers on social networks to boost a post to increase Reach. Under the hood, this is really just making it an ad.
• The post has an external link. Social networks know you can't see more ads on the network if you leave it, so they penalize these. On Instagram they aren't even clickable - your only options there are one link in your profile, and Stories can now have a clickable link. Some research suggests that you can avoid this penalty by putting the link in a comment. Others suggest that editing the post avoids this penalty, so posting without it, waiting a few minutes, then editing to add the post.
• Too many hashtags (see notes below).

Factors That Boost Reach After You Post

Since they want to keep you on their site, social networks will prioritize showing you 'interesting' content. Of course, an algorithm has no concept of 'interesting' so they use engagement with the post as a proxy. These are the factors that define engagement with a post. Each ?? below is a measure of the relative increase in Reach you get from a user engaging with your post:

• Read More. Ever wonder why social networks cut off the majority of the post and hide it behind a 'read More' toggle? It's a measure of engagement. Using this user interface model allows them to give posts approximately equal space in your feed. If a user is interested enough in the initial part of your post to read more, that means the post is 'interesting'. ??
• Dwell Time. Does a user click through to your post, and how long do they spend on it? This is called 'dwell time', and it gives you a small boost to reach.??
• Likes. You get a boost when a user clicks the like button. On networks that support it you get a small additional bump for a special interaction, like the Haha on facebook or 'Insightful' on LinkedIn. ??????(??)

• Comments. If someone's interested enough in your post to write back, that's engagement gold. Additionally, likes and comments will rebroadcast to a portion of the network of the person who engaged with your post, which makes them especially valuable. ??????????????
• Reposts. When someone re-shares your post to their network, with or without a comment, It starts a new post from their account that follows all of these same guidelines about initial reach and after-post factors. It also is considered engagement on your post. How much of a boost it gives depends on whether they add comments or not. If not, it's considered equivalent to a like, and if so, it's equivalent to a comment.
• First hour multiplier. Social networks, like so many of their users, are trying to go 'viral'. So they consider recent engagement after a post to be especially valuable. On LinkedIn this was typically defined as engagement within the first hour, although there's debate as to the current value. Of the engagement types above, interactions within this time window have a larger effect on Reach compared to later ones.

'Going viral' refers to a situation where there are so many of these engagement measures being recorded that the posts Reach increases dramatically in a short period of time.

Notes

Hashtags

Hashtags are a way to pick up viewers who don't have a network connection to you. It can be a hack to bypass the algorithm, but note that hashtags are not really used outside of video-based networks; YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram. On other networks, don't bother.

Groups

For networks that support them (LinkedIn & Facebook mostly), posts to a group follow a different algorithm and can give you Reach to people you otherwise aren't connected to. On LinkedIn they aren't used much, but if you can become a member of a Facebook group you can really get good post Reach there (but beware, lots of these groups have restrictions against commercial intent).

Tips & Tricks

Now that we've defined how Reach is calculated, here are some tips for maximizing yours.

• Authenticity matters. Post through personal pages of leaders rather than brand/company pages, to increase Reach. Always tag the brand page where appropriate. Generally however, use the brand page more like a press release engine (But do use it for LinkedIn Newsletters while they're a new format)
• Gotta give to get. Your initial Reach, as we described above, is defined as the accounts with most frequent mutual engagement. Your likes and comments on others' posts are like Reach in the bank when you post yourself, so if you want to increase your Reach, engage with others' posts.
• Use new formats where you can. If someone asks you if you want free Reach you say yes.
• Images on posts don't affect Reach specifically, but if your post has images it'll take up more screen real estate in users' feeds, increasing their likelihood of engaging with it. Additionally, people also are generally more visually attracted to pictures than to text.
• Use a ??? First sentence. Because 'Read More' is an engagement metric, starting your post with a provocative first sentence can get more people to click 'Read More, giving you a boost to Reach.
• A technique that's so hot right now: Develop a piece of content that you think people will want. Make a post describing it and telling people to comment on the post and you'll send them the link via direct message. If you can get over the fact that this often feels cringe, it's a great way to get comments on your post and increase its odds of going viral.