Facebook just rolled out it’s new algorithm for posts that can kill your engagement. With its recent crackdown, it can spell disaster for your business.
The new algorithm facebook implemented is designed to crackdown on what is known as “engagement bait”.
In a blog post by facebook they explain that posts that attempt to encourage blatant “reactions” such as a like, “voting”, and “shares”, it will now downgrade and penalize the organic reach of your posts.
So what does this mean now for affiliate marketers?
We’ve all done it, and seen it. I know I’m guilty.
“If you want to learn how to make x comment below”
Or “if you want to get info like this post and share it”
Well according to facebook these types of post will cost you.
According to a recent arstechnica.com article,
“The company defines engagement bait posts as any that encourage interaction to “artificially boost engagement” and glean more reach on the site—posts that say, “Like this post if you’re an Aries or Love this if you’re a Leo,” and other spam-like messages.Facebookhas reviewed and categorized thousands of posts like this so it could update its news feed algorithm to identify engagement bait posts and demote them on your news feed.”
Now while this is meant for the more clickbait style pages and posts, this certainly falls into the category where affiliate marketers will be affected. I can prove it.
Take a look at my engagement levels pre-october and post-october. These shots are from my own analytics.
See the difference?
So now what does this mean for us affiliate marketers looking to squeeze as much free traffic from social media?
Our focus needs to be on Better content!
Our marketing need to give More value!
And Video now will be more important than ever.
This is how we will win. If we focus on helping our audience with more value we won’t have to worry.
Let’s face it, it was bound to happen. It is time to step up our game and not hedge all our bets on Facebook and their new algorithms.
Here are 3 things we can do right now to keep engagement up and our affiliate marketing flourishing.
- Be authentic. Forget about asking for likes and shares. Facebook wants genuine people providing genuine content with real world value
- Do research. See what your audience cares about. Talk about what they care about.
- Solve problems. Pay attention to what your demographic are struggling with and let them know you’ve found a solution. Heck you might even get paid in the process.
So is this the end for promoting on facebook? Surely not. It’s time to create even better content and ine above the rest.
If you enjoyed this article please share it and if you have any ideas on how we can provide better content for genuine engagement please share your ideas below in the comments section.
Facebook algorithm
