Is Facebook really in favor of relevant content from brands?

I have been working with Social Media these past 9 years and one Network has been dominating most of my strategies, plans and tactics: Facebook. You could say that I have a love-hate relationship with the brand. I love it for what it is, a network where both people and brands are able to work on personal relationships. It embodies the potential of creative on different levels, and is able to add value to the eco-system of a brand.

I hate it as well, as you can never really trust it, as the work you are preparing for today can become obsolete by a flip of a switch at Facebook HQ tomorrow. Also, we (mere mortals) cannot influence its development locally, and even on an international level with a backing of a huge buying power it is near impossible to get things worked on. Facebook is still a company that controls its own development religiously (with huge success I might add).

Transparency

Regardless, the thing that bothers me the most at this point is that we are not talking about transparency of facts and figures. It is interesting to see and hear both Google and Facebook use this word often. And most of the time they are pointing towards other media-owners and media agencies to be more open about the ways they are making money, or how their data is being used . And although they are spending a tremendous amount of money to lobby for an exception to the EU's proposal of Safe Harbour 2.0, they are not spending much money on true transparency of data usage (which helps people to mistrust both brands). However this is not a rant about the unfairness or hypocrisy of the world, rather this is an open question on the fundamentals of what makes a company, like Facebook work.  

It all begins and ends with Facebook's Algortihm

I think we can all agree that Facebook has build its success on its well guarded algorithm. In theory this algorithm should present the users with the most relevant content that is best suited to the behavior and profile of the user. I think that this has been the case and still is in all personal messages that are created by or shared by your connections. The timeline has started overflowing with content, and no matter how often you go to Facebook, chances are that you will see at least 10 new pieces of content every time. I think over a billion of daily users proofs the point that this is a successful formula.  

Nonetheless, I think that this all changes when we are start talking about brand messages, and especially when start talking about advertised updates. I have done so many Facebook advertisement campaigns in the past years that I feel that something is up, although there is no clear answer about this. Marketing Land has created a great overview of all the changes to the Newsfeed algortithm the past 2 years and the removal of the original EdgeRank. However there is no trusted source to talk about what the effect is of these changes on promoted posts. 

Furthermore we see Facebook constantly tweak which content needs to be showed to client, which leads to the most interaction: "We will rank stories higher in feed which we think people might take action on, and which people might want to see near the top of their News Feed". It makes sense that native video gets a higher "score", and that text only updates are reduced to almost no reach versus other posts, but how the changes have affected the cost per click, cost per mille is unclear. To me these effects are super interesting. In general, if I use buying ad buying software, both native and 3rd party, and if I use "average quality" posts, for "an average brand", for "an average audience" (lets say larger than 2 million people) there are some remarkable discoveries to be made.

Examples which fuel questions

What I see when using Optimized CPM (oCPM) for reach, it actually gives me lower cost per thousand. But at the same time this will also give a higher cost per click. You would say, so far so good, the buying software (gives me on average) a higher cost per click because the role of the content was awareness and no engagement. Second example: where I use oCPM for clicks optimization. I indeed get a lower cost per click, but at the same time the cost per thousand goes up. Again you could say the software identifies and activates the right parameter, but if we would look at original content, that is not boosted, this would make no sense at all.

Bear with me, as I explain my reasoning. Content that gets a lower cost per click, means that more people are willing to interact with the content (behavior which you could translate to "relevancy"). "Engagement" should trump "opportunity to see" any day, and so if my friend, who just got a baby- son share a picture and gets 100 interactions in the first day, it will probably be boosted to make sure as many people of his network will see this. This is how Facebook's algorithm makes sure that content that appears to be relevant is shown to all the people that it believes find it relevant, and so it optimizes the way we see content (this is confirmed in the quote shown above, concerning their latest updates)

A brand versus friend conundrum, a double punishment?

When apply this same reasoning to branded content, and suddenly it feels a bit off that when I pay to advertise and this content is relevant, that no more people are seeing it. It makes me wonder if Facebook is really interested in quality content that is clickable? Or are they rather more interested in getting the most advertisement dollars from average advertisers of average brands as possible?

If so, I understand that Facebook is constantly weighing the fact if people are not seeing to much branded content. And in all likelihood this is in favor of user generated content. Which I'm all for by the way, but a fact that complicates what the best content strategy is for our clients. But it would be nice if we could be "transparent" about the chances of a brand to be seen, and the true cost they will have to invest in their media. In all honesty Facebook will probably be still the most cost effective, but also highly efficient channel in comparison to other channels. On top of that it could be so that some brands simply should think about not doing anything on Facebook, as they are not helped by the algorithm, but rather slowed by it.

Dear reader, I would love to hear your thoughts. When you agree or disagree, please let me know and leave a comment. I would love to solve this conundrum.

Disclaimer: all views and opinions expressed are my own.