ANNOUNCEMENT: Our facebook page

Discussion in 'Information and Announcements' started by pippa@labforumHQ, Feb 24, 2014.

  1. pippa@labforumHQ

    pippa@labforumHQ Administrator

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    About our Facebook Page

    I have put this up on Facebook, but as Facebook has reduced the reach of ‘pages’ so dramatically over the last four months, I’ll put it up here too.



    Someone on our facebook page asked if this was a scam to get emails and in case anyone else is worried on that score, here are a few links you can read on the issue

    Facebook admits organic reach is falling
    40% fall in Facebook reach

    Facebook have made a post about this too, which you can read here

    The key point Facebook makes is

    Facebook goes on to say

    Whenever we put a post up on facebook now, it is generally shown to less than 10% percent of our fans. So you have a one in ten chance of seeing our posts. We do a lot better in this respect than other pages (many are reporting a reach of 2 and 3%) because we have a relatively high level of engagement on ours. However, to maintain this engagement is quite a lot of work.

    Facebook offers a ‘boost’ button now, at the foot of every post we put up on a page, and the estimated cost for us to show a single post to all our fans will usually be around £90-£120. As we post 2-3 times a day, that would cost us £2,000 plus per week, just to have all our fans see our posts!

    Obviously this makes no sense to anyone that is not selling products from their page, or building/maintaining a major retail brand, and it is terribly sad for charities, clubs, and small local businesses that have put huge efforts into building a Facebook community.

    We are going to carry on for the time being, finding interesting stories and videos to share, pulling popular articles from the archives and posting all our newly published stuff on the page for the time being. But be aware that your chances of seeing it are getting slimmer.

    For that reason, we will be compiling some of this information, in a regular newsletter for our subscribers, in addition to the blog articles that we currently send out this way. And if our reach continues to fall, we may have to review the time and effort we put into the page at the moment.

    So, if you want to keep up with our stories, tips, news etc, the best way to do that now and in the future, is via our subscribers emails, which you can sign up for using this link.

    Another concern expressed on the FB thread was with regard to the use/misuse of emails. I can assure you that our list is run by professional email management company Aweber and cannot be shared or used for any other purpose than sending you Labrador site news and articles.
     
  2. heidrun

    heidrun Supporting Member Forum Supporter

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    Re: ANNOUNCEMENT: Our facebook page

    Pippa, I wonder how many people know about the 'get notification' function and not just the 'like' button for pages like the Labrador Site. On my iPad I hold on the like button and the 'get notification' function comes up. I am hoping that by ticking that function I will get all the new posts from my favourite sites.
     
  3. pippa@labforumHQ

    pippa@labforumHQ Administrator

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    Re: ANNOUNCEMENT: Our facebook page

    It might be worth posting up about that! I've clicked on it for a few sites, but I don't think it puts posts in your timeline. I think it add a number to the little badge on the world symbol at the top of your page?

    I tend to just scroll down my timeline, and forget about the badge until there are so many notifications, I haven't got time to read them all. :) I just hate the way Facebook censors what I see in my timeline, I use my personal profile mainly to keep up with my kids, and grandkids, and half the time, FB doesn't show me their posts anyway :mad:
     
  4. David

    David Registered Users

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    Re: ANNOUNCEMENT: Our facebook page

    Interesting. I hadn't realised that that was what was going on. I do boost my business posts but only around $5 per hit as they are targeted just at friends and their friends. Throwing more money at it in my case would be a waste as I'm only trying to target like minded people so a wider reach would be way off beam. Also I only post every few days so cost not a real issue.

    Looks like it might be time to walk away from Face Book if they are deliberately trunkating the reach of posts to force a paid boost. Have you thought about alternatives?
     
  5. pippa@labforumHQ

    pippa@labforumHQ Administrator

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    Re: ANNOUNCEMENT: Our facebook page

    There is a problem in this respect with the boost button. And I only discovered this recently.

    I decided to boost the post above as Facebook had only shown it to about 7,000 of our 178,000 fans.

    If you go into the adverts management panel, you will see that when you press ‘boost’ facebook actually creates three campaigns, not one.

    These are

    To fans
    Sponsored stories
    To friends of fans

    When I looked in to see how the campaign was progressing I was shocked to discover the way that FB was allocating my budget. FB had sent the post to 25,000 plus ‘friends’ of my fans - who would have no idea what it was about. And to just over 2,000 of my actual fans, for whom the message was intended.

    So, pressing ‘boost’ may not be helping you reach many more of your fans, the people who liked your page in the first place. But hugely prioritises their friends. People that may not even be interested in the subject matter of your page and certainly have not liked it, or asked to see its posts.

    I think most page owners are not aware of this at all. I halted the campaign at that point.

    I struggle to see how it can even be legal for FB to do this. But there you go…

    As for alternatives – we have a pinterest page which is quite fun. But not so social as FB
     
  6. drjs@5

    drjs@5 Registered Users

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    Re: ANNOUNCEMENT: Our facebook page

    I haven't explored pinterest at all. I am as scared of it as Twitter.
    Partly scared as I spend enough on the computer as it is........
     

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