Yesterday, we posted about Google’s ‘Mobilegeddon’ and the changing algorithm and optimization of mobile-friendly sites in search engines.  Today I came across another article from Contently called “What Facebook’s Algorithm Change Means for Brands, Publishers, and the Future of Media.”  The article discusses changes in how Facebook is going to change it’s News Feed.  The changes, according to Contently, are:

1. If your News Feed doesn’t have much on it (i.e., you don’t have many virtual friends or like many pages), Facebook is now allowing for “multiple posts from the same source in a row.”

2. After receiving feedback from users that they’re concerned about missing important updates from friends they care about, Facebook is giving content posted by those friends greater priority: “Content posted directly by the friends you care about, such as photos, videos, status updates or links, will be higher up in News Feed so you are less likely to miss it,” Facebook wrote. On the other hand, if you use Facebook more to read news and updates from pages, you’ll still see those updates. Basically, after expanding the reach of publisher pages for a whilenow, they appear to be prioritizing friends again in the feed.

3. You’ll see a lot less of “Suzy liked this post” or “Jimmy made a really weird comment on a post from a page that you couldn’t care less about”-style updates. Instead, you’ll see more updates from friends and pages you follow directly.

Contently warns that this may still hurt Facebook’s Pages already limited reach.

Late last year, Facebook delivered a big blow to brands when they limited what little organic reach they had left. Now, they seem to be threatening to limit reach even more.

Loyal followers that interact with your content will continue to be served posts; unfortunately, that group is very small for most brands, and this change may decrease their odds of growing it at all. After all, second-hand referrals through likes or comments will be marginalized, and besides paid posts and advertising, this was pretty much only way users who didn’t already “like” your page could organically discover a brand’s content.

To me, this proves what we’ve been saying and promoting all along.  Don’t rely on social media as your main source of marketing / advertising.

While there is a wise way to post on Facebook, I think the days of Facebook driving a business ‘organically’ (without paid advertising) are over.

Content is still king and what people are looking for.  You clients are looking for valuable information and want to know that you are the ‘king’ of your business.  If you have a reason for people to remember you then they will come to you.  Whether it’s through a website, them looking for your Facebook, or a Newsletter.  You should use social media to help promote and prove who you are and why you’re the best at doing it.

If you’re interested in learning a little more about Facebook’s changing algorithm, I’ll included some links below: