Facebook continues to undergo major changes
Using Facebook’s analytics help you understand how social media is benefiting your business. If you are feeling discouraged because you lost Likes in April, you aren’t alone. The top 20 brands on Facebook lost over one million Likes combined. This includes Walmart and Disney, who generally gain ground over time. Why would these two huge companies lose more fans than they gain?
This spring, Facebook announced that it would be removing deactivated and memorial accounts from the counts of “Likes” on business pages. Their philosophy is that these Likes are not meaningful for businesses. As for the deactivated accounts, if the account is reactivated, their Likes will again count toward your analytics.
Etsy and ESPN lost out in a major way
It was reported that Etsy lost 99.99 percent of its Facebook Likes, but this was not because it had so many inactive accounts, but due to a “global brand pages migration,” which was subsequently fixed. ESPN (UK) also lost almost 50 percent of its Likes.
Some of the criticism for this move was concern for page managers attempting to explain to their bosses about the loss of Likes. However, this was more like haircut that trims up the loose ends and makes your hair appear healthier. Your business can engage with the users who actually want your product.
In the past couple of years, Facebook Likes have become important for analyzing the demographics of people who use your brand. This lets you target users with similar profiles. By removing users who are not active, you get better data about the people who are actually interacting with your brand.
So how can you keep your page’s Likes?
Now that you have accurate information about your users, to keep those Likes, your business needs to be providing quality content on Facebook. Walmart has more than 32 million Likes, even after the purge. How do they keep these people engaged? Their posts are not advertisements for products, but local information about Bentonville, safety information about bikes, and non-profit information. You may not have the same reach as Walmart, but you can engage with your own customers.
It may surprise you to know that Cointreau, a brand of Triple Sec, earned the top spot for Facebook engagement in March with 29.99 percent, coming in second, Air Extreme Heating and Cooling (29.10 percent), third, Animals Matter Luxury Pet Products (26.91). If you need help bringing your Facebook pages to life, check out their pages and see what they’re doing to engage their followers.
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