The New Scary Facebook Update That Will Affect Your Organic Reach

Facebook recently rolled out a new feature called Explore feed as a test in six countries - Sri Lanka, Bolivia, Slovakia, Serbia, Guatemala, and Cambodia.  it has now been officially launched in other countries as well. It is on both the mobile and desktop devices.

The Facebook Explore Feed is supposed to be a separate feed compared to the News Feed in order to create a different space for posts from Facebook pages, news organizations or publishers users are not following.  It provides users with interesting content such as photos, videos, memes, and articles.

This makes it easy for users to easily find content from friends and family in the main news feed while other stuff sits in the Explore Feed. Companies that pay for placement will also show in the news feed.  

Also, it is designed to increase users' time on site or on mobile. With this, Facebook can easily serve more ads in between the content, photos and videos, etc. Although it is not currently monetized, it may be in the nearest future.

The content in the explore feed is similar to posts you or people you followed have already liked, engaged with or recommended by Facebook. The posts are tagged at the top with "Popular among followers of" with a specific page name or "Popular with your friends".

The Explore feed also provides suggestions for top groups, local places, recommendations, where to find Wi-Fi hotspot and jobs.

This implies that for you to see posts from pages you follow, you will need to go to the explore feed! This is the scary part. How many people are willing to go to a separate tab daily to see posts from their favorite Facebook pages? Not likely.

What does this mean for business?

A lot of businesses use Facebook to get brand visibility, traffic and sales for their products and services. Facebook helps businesses to reach thousands of potential customers worldwide.  But, Facebook has been rolling out different algorithms that have negative effects on businesses.

The algorithm updates might not be good for businesses, but it works for Facebook. It has helped Facebook to filter out “bad” content to keep users engaged on the platform. Which of course makes sense.

Facebook is more concerned about its users than the brands. According to the Facebook head of news feed Adam Mosseri, there are no plans to rollout this update globally but he had to say this about it, "Our mission on news feed is to connect people to the stories that matter to them the most".

If Facebook cares too much for the brands over users, the platform will potentially lose users. As long as Facebook keep its users happy, they will continue to increase in numbers. These numbers are important to advertisers. If advertisers find it important, then Facebook makes more money.

So this scary new update which isn’t fully rolled out yet, looks like another road block for businesses who are reaching their target audiences on Facebook for free.  Organic reach is potentially going to nose-dive.

In fact, most businesses are already reporting enormous drop in organic reach on Facebook. A drop in reach means less engagements, clicks and sales. This is not good for small businesses that do not really have the budget to pay for ads on the platform.

Secondly, if and when Facebook migrates all organic posts to the explore feed, businesses may need to pay more to be placed in the user feeds where brands can be seen, thus making more money for the platform.

What can businesses do to adapt in order to stay ahead?

Many businesses rely entirely on Facebook to drive traffic and sales for their products or services.  The time has come to make changes. You will need to find other ways to get to the news feed organically, so you can continue to drive traffic and sales to your business.

Secondly, quality content will win all the time. If you can produce valuable content that inspires people, it will be shared and you will get more exposure. No more shitty content.

You will also need to learn how to diversify and start using paid ads. Most small business owners do not know how Facebook ads work.  Facebook has a lot of tutorials on how to advertise your product or services on its platform and many experts have videos, blogs and other materials to help you.

Posting consistently can also help to reach more people. This will help you to build engagement and post impressions. You could try to post at least twice daily to make it easy for users to discover your content. More importantly it’s about consistency.

Conclusion

Facebook will always change its algorithm to suit its users. This can be negative for your business. Therefore, you need to learn how to adapt to these changes. Look for other channels to source for traffic and sales, try your hands on paid ads and also produce quality content always.

More and more valuable content is winning, if you don’t know how to create this, If you don’t know how to actually engage people. You’re probably doomed or will just have to pay more money.

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