How to 10X Organic Reach and Engagement on Facebook
If you want to increase your organic reach on Facebook, you are going to love this week’s episode of The Wellness Business Podcast!
Over the past 3-4 years, most of us have noticed a dramatic decline in our reach and engagement on our business pages (1-5% is now the norm).
We have been experimenting with a strategy that has resulted in 10x (and higher) reach and engagement for us, so we wanted to share it with you.
On this episode, you’ll learn:
- The types of posts are getting more than 10x engagement for us right now, so you can use this simple strategy too
- How to incorporate this simple strategy starting today to see a boost in reach and interaction with your followers
- Mindset shifts in how to use your business page for your marketing and the role it plays now
Back in 2018, Facebook made an announcement that they are changing the algorithm and they stated: “We are no longer about content, we are about meaningful engagement”. Since then, Facebook pages have seen a significant drop in reach.
It’s not all doom and gloom though and we’ll tell you why, and how you can
10x your reach and engagement on Facebook right now. The good news is that it’s actually very easy to do and it doesn’t cost you anything. 10x may seem dramatic but I’ve been getting up to 30x engagement using what we are talking about today.
Here’s what we know and what we need to pay attention to and implement if we want to reach more people. According to information shared by Michael Stelzner of Social Media Examiner “Facebook is not a big focus for driving traffic – it’s about being Top of Mind – being in front of your prospects and customers.” In order to be top of mind, people have to see your content and right now, Facebook is showing us that text-based posts with colored backgrounds are reaching a lot more people. We will link to the YouTube video from Mike Stelzner in this post that explains some of what we’re covering today. I started testing this out last October and it blew my mind!
Your FB page is mostly now best used for being a top of funnel strategy. That means thinking about it as a place where people get exposure to you on a regular basis for brand recognition and staying top of mind. This means creating content that gets conversations going and gets your followers commenting and sharing your posts, rather than just posting content. This is what Facebook considers “meaningful engagement,” so we have to remember this as we are posting on our page.
So, what does this look like and how do you implement it?
The best way to do this right now is to use text only posts that have a colored or patterned background and you’ll see this when you go to create a post (it’s not possible to do this from a 3rd party app that I know of, so it will need to be a native post on the FB platform) and you’ll see the option to select from a few dozen backgrounds. Some are solid colors, and some have colorful patterns. You can do this from mobile or desktop and when you go to write a post, select the background you want.
There is a limit to the number of characters you can use with these backgrounds, so they are best used for asking questions you want your audience to answer or for sharing a short message where you want to get a response from your followers.
NOTE: We don’t recommend using these as your only form of content but test it out 1-2 times a week to see how it goes. Mix it in with your other forms of content such as:
- Videos (live and recorded)
- Motivational quote graphics
- Content posts where you share a helpful tip along with an image
- Infographics or whatever other types of images your audience responds to
- Share other people’s content that relates to your niche
Here is what we have been testing…
Back in October, I started testing these on my page because I know when I see these types of posts, they really stand out and grab my attention. I thought I would try it and the results were mind blowing.
On my page of approximately 18,000 followers, I went from typical organic reach of about 100 people to 18-23 times that with posts reaching between 1,800 – 3,000 people! Instead of getting hardly any comments at all, I would get up to 50! I would say that is a pretty darn significant increase! It started off a little lower than that, but it started to build as weeks went by. Part of the higher reach was people commenting and answering questions, so that was prompting the algorithm to show that content to more and more people.
One post was simply asking “What is your title, Health Coach, Nutritionist or something else?” Another one was in December and that was asking the question “Are you doing any traveling during the holidays?”
You can also use these in your FB group. I’ve been doing more of these in my group vs using more professional looking graphics and it’s working really well.
How can you use this?
Make a list of a few simple questions you can ask using these types of posts and see what your audience responds to the most. The questions don’t necessarily have to relate to your niche – it’s about finding common ground and getting to know your audience and vice versa. Be observant and see what others are doing and use that for inspiration and ideas.
So, the mindset shift here is looking at how your Facebook page fits into your overall strategy knowing that they are putting priority on posts that generate interaction and conversations. This is still an important part of your ‘awareness’ strategy for your marketing and it doesn’t mean you can’t use other forms of content too. Try it, test it, and be open to experimenting a bit to see what works for you.
Let us know how it goes!
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