Facebook organic reach is not dead, but you will need to work harder to get eyes on your pages. Here’s a rundown of what experts are saying will help you reach your audience. Facebook is still the top social media platform that marketers use and where consumers tend to look for and follow brand pages. So don’t despair!
Those running Facebook business pages have been seeing ever diminishing returns on their effort at getting their content in front of their audiences and fans, especially since around 2016. Yet Facebook remains the #1 platform for building an audience. Once upon a time, Facebook was incredibly fertile soil to grow our entrepreneurial and creative gardens in, at little to no cost to us. Many businesses are seeing a drastic reduction in reach, meaning that a tiny percentage of people are seeing our posts, even among those who follow our pages.
Have you ever heard something like, “The first one’s always free; that’s how they get you”? This has long been a business philosophy to hook prospective customers, used by savvy marketers and drug dealers alike. Facebook went and took that to the next level, introducing an easy-to-use platform where almost anyone could find and engage with their target audiences of customers, fans, members, and more.
Of course, there had to be a reckoning, and now that Facebook has more than 2.6 billion active monthly users worldwide, they continue to change the rules. Consider the amount of users and the amount of posts being made, and it makes more sense that Facebook tries to narrow the audience for any single post to a reasonable chunk. Otherwise, our brains would explode (okay, my words, not an actual medical opinion). Really, you don’t need to reach everybody, because not everybody is interested in what you’re offering. You need to reach the right people who are going to engage and build a smaller, engaged loyal group of diehard customers.
Community is key
Here are some of the latest tips and best practices to increase organic reach in 2021, provided by Facebook pros. Mark Zuckerburg keeps bringing up the concept of community, and the algorithm favors engagement, not only on Facebook, but across platforms. Nobody wants products and services constantly jammed in their faces.
This is a conversation, not a one-way portal into your customers’ brains and wallets. A constant barrage of salesy content, urging people to buy buy buy, grows real tedious real fast. “If you build it, they will come.” Only instead of a baseball field in the middle of nowhere, work to build a community.
Ask yourself these questions:
- Are you creating conversations?
- Are you using your platform to act as a resource and provide helpful or inside information in your niche or area of expertise?
- Are you asking your audience what they want and would like to see more of from you?
- Are you taking current events and trends into account, reacting to local/national/world news at all, and creating timely posts?
- Are you using a variety of post types (photos, videos, links) and taking advantage of Facebook’s built in post tools?
- Are you taking data into account for what content people are responding to favorably and when?
- Do you ever invest in Facebook ads or boosted posts for important content or events?
Find the answer to these questions to reevaluate your strategy, work on promoting a dialogue with your audience, and ideally you will see more engagement on your pages, fruitful interactions that ultimately lead to loyal customers and bigger sales.
Create Conversations
Zuckerburg himself comes back to this point repeatedly in his regular updates on the state of all things Facebook and how the algorithm works, saying Facebook will “prioritize posts that spark conversations and meaningful interactions between people.” Not every industry lends itself to deep thoughts, but it can be simple enough to engage your audience with community questions. People love giving their opinions or talking about a shared interest.
Community questions can be fun, lively, and create fun interaction between your audience and the business. A simple This or That question posted on one of the background color templates can get the conversation started. If people don’t have to invest a lot of time to answer, then great! Depending on the industry, these can be easy one-offs: Red wine or white? Beach vacation or mountains? TikTok or Reels? Mac or PC? Harley Davidson hogs or Kawasaki crotch rockets? Early bird or night owl?
Hot takes, unpopular opinions, are another way to get people chatting. I’m not espousing trying to stir up controversy here, unless that is appropriate for your business, but people get emotional as all get out for something as simple as pineapple on pizza or beans in chili. What’s a popular or common opinion in your field? How can you introduce a hot take to get people chatting? For an entrepreneurial page, you could put out a hot take on a cluttered desk, or making lists, or standing desks.
Sure, these conversations may start out superficial, but who knows? When people begin interacting on your page more, they begin seeing more that you post, and that’s when you can introduce something a little weightier, asking them to share their expertise or advice on a relevant topic.
Become a resource
Whether your business is a science journal, digital marketing, interior designing, or a Texas Hill Country resort, your business and your audience is unique. Real estate agencies have become good at this, so we’ll use them as an example. If you are selling or leasing properties in Austin or San Francisco, sell the area. Don’t only post the properties you’re selling or agent profiles. Post those, yes, but also post industry news and local attractions.
When people are interested in moving to a new city or a new neighborhood or investing in opening a business there, they need to know why the area is attractive. What is the business climate? What are the financial perks associated with living there? What is the area known for (local restaurants, live music hiking trails, swimming holes, no traffic)? Has the area made a list for quality of life, affordability, great job prospects in X industry? Sharing blogs, articles, infographics, videos, and photos highlighting any of these can help your page serve the interests of your target audience. This is a good thing.
Ask your audience
This is a simple tip for keeping things closer to your audience’s interests, helping you identify areas where your page may be lacking–and opportunities for growth, and keeping the conversation going. Be careful not to overuse this one, but it’s an important tool.
- Try a simple question, such as “What would you like to see more of on this page?”
- Create a poll, which is much faster to answer, and helps you narrow answers down to what you really want to know.
- Similar to the community questions, ask them to share something that has helped them. A classic example would be “What is the best entrepreneurial advice anyone has even given you?” Or “Please share some tips to fight procrastination.” Or “What is the top time-saving tool you use in your business (or for scheduling)?” Having your page followers (and hopefully others) chat with each other this way is helpful for them and for your organic reach.
Take current events and trends into account
This one’s simple: Read the room. This goes both ways. If there is renewed interest in, say, downtown lofts or sea shanty dances on TikTok, can you use this momentary heat to bring interest to your page? On the other hand, if there is a natural disaster, tragedy, or financial crash that has caused great suffering in an area? That’s a good moment to review your scheduled posts and delete or postpone anything that could be unintentionally triggering or offensive.
Some types of businesses are better suited to jumping on the latest trend. Do you have a bar or restaurant with a fairly young, social media savvy crowd? Go ahead, Photoshop that Bernie-Sanders-in-mittens image sitting on your patio (only if you can do it as the trend is hitting). Are you targeting an area that has recently been hit by extended power outages? I’m sorry to tell you, but this is not the time to promote that popup restaurant where diners experience eating in the dark.
Mix it up and use native Facebook tools
Of course you want to stay on brand, but please don’t get caught in a rut where all of your posts are one type. Consistency is one thing, but beware that this doesn’t turn into monotony. Assess where you can change things up. Add photos, videos, links to relevant blogs and articles, or community questions. Different people respond differently to different types of input. Use all the tools at your disposal to generate interest, draw people in, and get them reacting to and engaging with your page.
Facebook and all social media platforms have built in tools. They want you to use them. Often, this is a Facebook effort to capitalize on a similar, competing app. Trust me when I say, you will get brownie points (higher reach) when you take the time to use these native tools. Facebook Watch, Facebook Live, Facebook Stories, even using a background color template from the Facebook options, are all ways to show Facebook you’re paying attention and want to optimize the tools they are giving you.
Use provided data
You need to be able to look for patterns, evaluate the factors that made a particular post popular, and know when your customers and followers are likely to see your page and interact with it. Facebook provides a number of insights in the platform, but there are numerous external marketing tools you can purchase or sometimes use for free (depending on how many pages and platforms you are running, and how in-depth you want your data to be).
Posting willy nilly is not the most effective way to be. Decide what data is useful to you and make time to study it, and be willing to make changes to your content strategy based on the data. Like many other aspects of marketing, expanding your organic reach is a mixture of art and science, a balancing act of intuition and cold, hard numbers. Use them.
Consider paying to play
I know, I know, this story is about organic and not paid reach, but the fact is strategically paying for a Facebook ad or boosting a post to highlight a launch, event, special deal, or other important news will bring more people to your page. If the other tips, tools, and best practices referred to here are in place, once they find your page, you have the ability to keep their attention through organic means.
Keep on truckin’
These tips should help you expand your page’s organic reach. More importantly, they should help you build and support a community, earn loyal followers and customers, and generate positive buzz about your business. Keep working on becoming a resource and sharing helpful information. Have fun with it and experiment with new media and types of posts. Know yourself. Know your audience.
Benn Rosales
November 19, 2009 at 1:34 am
‘blanking’ Amen! There is a hunger for discussion which is why so many are flocking to conferences all over the country, and made to sound chic by con-goers, but it’s always empty with the tell tale signs of “the actions in the hallways.” Really? That says to me the conference was lame, but the conversation’s in the hallways were worth every penny, maybe we should just move the room to the hallways and get some real synergy happening.
Daniel Bates
November 19, 2009 at 7:06 am
I thought the Real Estate Tomato’s 1st Virtual REBarCamp this week was a great (full disclosure – I work for the Tomato and spoke at the event). I hardly heard a sales pitch other than a 30 second introduction of who the speakers were. The information was fresh and relevant. Not only was it free and non profit, but donations to a charity were encouraged. I hear what you’re saying, I think the more specific a training event is the more opportunities it has to be well perceived by the target audience, but sometimes we do have to play to the common denomintor. The thing that I hate (and this has been 99.9% of all continuing ed classes) is when they dumb it down to the slowest person in the room and fail to provide any value for the people that attended looking for something more than they could find in 5 minutes of searching on google. That’s the benefit of multiple rooms, you can have a tech-savvy, beginners, brokers, and tech savvy room and let the participants select what to hear. I think we could do a better job in the future with identifying those rooms as such.
Duke Long
November 19, 2009 at 10:10 am
Brandie,
Just FYI, The Indiana Assoc.of Realtors has decided to use the first day of their 3 day conference in January to put on ReBarcamp Indiana. Myself @gregcooper and @rockplank are helping organize this event.The IAR has been well just unbelievable.They have totally embraced the concept.When we mentioned discussions, interaction, side conversations, jeans ,laptops, iphones, seo, twitter,facebook.They said “YES let’s do it”. I personally would have no reason to attend the old conference format because the obvious total waste of my time. Get me in a room let me meet some people ,brokers, lenders,title people who can help me with my business. I don’t want to listen to tax structures lobbying efforts and my state senator tell me how the government is “working to solve the problem.I hope the IAR event and events like it serve as a start for agents to get the Value from the associations they truly deserve. #justsayin
Todd Carpenter
November 20, 2009 at 12:11 pm
NAR holds an annual conference (AEI) for state and local real estate associations every spring. This year, I will be leading a session with Jay Thompson and Hilary Marsh on, “How to hold an un-conference”.
Even beyond real estate, I’m putting together an un-conference for association executives to help change their mindset about topics like these. https://unassociated.org . I hope to have the details in place to make it happen next spring in Washington D.C.
Brandie Young
November 20, 2009 at 2:05 pm
Hey Benn,
Interesting paradigm shift, isn’t it? IMHO the “educators” have lost credibility in their ability to develop enriching content. While peer-to-peer networking is important, I believe we all need proven expertise/experts from which to draw knowledge. I would love that expert to once again be trade associations, as I whole heartedly believe in the concept.
Bob Wilson
November 20, 2009 at 2:17 pm
At NAR, the real experts, those agents making serious bank, were not there.
I’m not sure people want education. They want a magic bullet and roam the halls looking for it, which is why you couldn’t swing a dead cat last week without hitting a vendor. Even the panels were more vendor than RE expert. One panel I saw had 3 vendor/consultant types and one agent. Another had a vendor that didnt have any experience at all on the given subject – just an opinion with nothing to back it up.
NAR was a sellout last week.
Brandie Young
November 20, 2009 at 2:08 pm
Daniel,
Glad you got some valuable info from that event. Sounds awesome. I doubt we will find a one size fits all solution, but I am hoping that we can see some change … Sounds like RE Tomato has a nice start!
Brandie Young
November 20, 2009 at 2:15 pm
Hi Duke,
It’s great to hear you cheer for you IAR! And, while it’s great they embrace the concept of Bar Camp, what are they doing to bring more value to the event they organize?
I’m not sure how much value I’d feel I’m getting from my dues if my association created a Bar Camp. Don’t get me wrong, I love the peer to peer interaction. It just feels like that’s a cop out, and they’ve swung their pendulum too far in the other direction.
I think there’s a happy medium here – although I’m not saying I have the recipe. That said, kudos to the IAR for listening and doing something…
Brandie Young
November 20, 2009 at 2:21 pm
Hiya Todd,
I’ve always admired your progressive attitude!
Regarding your AEI event, awesome. Perhaps you can add a session on developing enriching, relevant content?
I am excited to follow the progress of your Unassociated event. I think the challenge will be getting the right mix of higher-ups/industry big wigs to attend an educational event when they don’t realize they need to learn anything.
Brandie Young
November 20, 2009 at 2:26 pm
Hi Bob,
Thanks for chiming in. Sorry to hear you didn’t get much from NAR.
I agree, people want a magic bullet, but there is no such thing and they need to get in touch with that reality.
What you’ve conveyed here drives home my call for rich, relevant content .
Bob Wilson
November 20, 2009 at 2:32 pm
What I got from it came from the pros I sought out. I learned some great stuff on investment real estate, and had dinner with 4 agents where between us there was 100 years of experience. They would have been a fantastic panel.
It is just unfortunate that NAR would rather talk about how to use twitter instead of how to sell, since at the end of the day, that is what we do.
Duke Long
November 20, 2009 at 2:26 pm
The other two days of the 3 day conf. are Assoc stuff. They are providing the space and marketing help. The agenda and content (None of which the IAR is involved in at this point) is pure BarCamp. You have an interesting point. Remind me to answer your question after the event. Let the members of the Assoc. who attend decide Again thanks for bringing up the subject,I think it needs some air.
Brandie Young
November 20, 2009 at 2:40 pm
Bob
You raise some interesting points. Sounds like what was important to you was info on how to effectively sell in turbulence. Who better than your peers to hear this from.
I wonder if that, combined with the opportunity to hear from global economic heavyweights that can explain forward-looking trends in the economy, GSEs and others talking about the impact of loan mods and REOs would help you formulate a go-forward strategy to build/maintain a vibrant business?
Brandie Young
November 20, 2009 at 2:42 pm
Duke
Thank you for providing your input, and I’m happy to hear you feel it’s a topic worth discussing. I will look forward to hearing from you following the event.
Bob Wilson
November 20, 2009 at 2:51 pm
Brandie, that wasnt what was important to me. What was important was to hear from those with real hands on experience and success in anything in the RE space. That wasnt what we got. We got consultants who have never sold a house and self proclaimed SM and marketing gurus talking more theory than fact as a platform to promote themselves. Real heavyweights would be good. That wasnt what NAR served up.
Brandie Young
November 20, 2009 at 3:03 pm
Bob, Maybe someone at NAR is listening … (yoo hoo)
Todd Carpenter
November 20, 2009 at 3:05 pm
Bob,
I’m with you. I always prefer hearing what actual agents have to say over consultants. Our convention department struggles with programming though because they rarely get bad evaluations from those who attend the sessions. I guess it’s good manners or something. If you would like to express in detail which sessions discouraged you, I’ll be happy to share that with the people responsible for developing the program. If you’d rather say it in private, my email is tcar@realtor.org.
I’d like to extend this invitation to anyone else who attended NAR’s annual conference.
Brandie Young
November 20, 2009 at 5:50 pm
Todd,
You make an excellent point… if the feedback is polite, you don’t have enough info on what’s broken to even consider fixing it. Beyond attendee surveys, I’d probably want to measure # of butts in the seats per session and variance in YOY registration. Beyond that, I’d probably poll realtors and agents that did not attend and ask why, If the answer was relative value, I’d dig a little deeper for specifics.
Thanks.
Ken Montville
November 21, 2009 at 12:57 pm
The average or even the slightly above average Realtor is not anywhere near “C-level” in knowledge, experience, creativity or curiosity. People don’t get to be “C-level” by entering a profession with such a low bar to entry and low expectations for longevity.
Here’s my take on REBAR camps – I’ve been to four: They’re fun, they can provide interesting content and the networking is great (and I don’t even drink!). However, they tend to tilt heavily toward technology and people who know best about technology sell it or the services around it. REBAR camps tend to be a bit repetitive. Probably out of necessity. They’re in different locations all the time and they really target real estate professionals who are new to the technology and want to learn it – rarely the “C-level” type.
I agree with your basic premise that pure content, rich and highly usable content, presented in a way that provides authentic and open sharing without the pressure to buy is a wonderful aspiration.
As long as the real estate mainstream continues to promote postcards, refrigerator magnets, and tweeting your listing three times a day it ain’t gonna happen.
Bob Wilson
November 21, 2009 at 1:31 pm
Todd,
On one panel, only one was an agent. What I saw was 3 other vender/consultants talk about how to do stuff. Fine, except they have no IRL experience doing what they suggested in my medium. They had anecdotal evidence and they had their own experience, which doesnt translate.
For instance, the SM gurus are able to insert themselves into the real estate agent community online and use their techniques to sell to the community, then say “Hey, this works. Pay me and i’ll teach you”.
The problem with that is that the same model DOES NOT WORK when it comes to a model for selling homes. There is no twitter community I can invade that is primarily all the homeowners in a given sub-division. It doesn’t translate to a successful biz model, even though there are always enough exceptions for people to sell it as the way to go.
You also had a session where you had outside consultants talking about their opinions on listings. Smart folks, but no IRL experience. There are plenty of people within the industry who are not vendors that would have been far better in those situations, but they were no where to be found.
IMO one reason why the average agent gets far more out of their franchise convention is that they here mostly from those in the trenches doing it at extremely high levels. Its hands on info that can be translated into far more immediate results.
A few blocks away in the Gaslamp on 5th was an agent who has been one of the top agents in the US for the past 25 years who has made bank in every market cycle. I’ll bet if he tweeted he would have been picked to be on a panel, but alas he wasnt – too busy selling real estate.
My suggestion is to go to some of top companies and ask who they have that could add value to a NAR session. Then find some of the top independents in different markets and do the same. That info would be readily available from the local boards. Find the folks who are killing it and get them – not just those who are famous for being famous.
NAR is a trade group – focus on teaching your members the tricks of the trade from the craftsmen and the journeymen, as opposed to the apprentices, or worse, the vendors who only know how to demonstrate their power tools on a block of wood but couldn’t get hired on a real job site.
Brandie Young
November 21, 2009 at 7:12 pm
Hi Ken,
I hope I’ve told you I always appreciate your perspective and the time you take to offer your insights!
As far as NAR goes, I agree. You probably wouldn’t get a lot of C-level folks. I believe it differs for an organization like the MBA, or ABA. That said, there are Brokers who, especially as regional owners/partners could fall into the executive category.
Interesting takes on the Bar Camps. Particularly your observation they tend to be technology-centric. It might be interesting as a follow up to the Bar Camps the topics were posted. They very well may do that, I don’t know. And, since it’s put on by volunteers how fair is it to ask them to do more?
Brandie Young
November 21, 2009 at 7:19 pm
Bob,
Awesome feedback. I’m sure Todd and other NAR folks appreciate your candor.
Thought/question: I always find it interesting when people think you can only learn from others with apples-to-apples experience. I hear you on the examples you sited, and that sounds fair. But, what if it was a parallel situation – a service provider in relationship-based selling. Could you garner and nuggets from such a person?
I’m just curious.
Bob Wilson
November 21, 2009 at 7:56 pm
Brandie, good question.
Last week I was at NAR because NAR came to San Diego. Normally I would be in Las Vegas for PubCon, which is search and online convention that started with some webmasters sharing tricks in a bar. This grew from a few dozen to over a 1000 in 7 years.
At PubCon you have sessions led by pros who are recognized experts on their subjects who have also been able to put into practice what they teach and have results you can point to as testament to what can be done. So when an Aaron Wall talks about SEO, it isnt just theory, but experience that has allowed Aaron to be quite successful. When someone mentions an SM guru, it is someone like Neil Patel who has made major bucks before he was 21 leveraging SM. You may know one of his businesses – CrazyEgg.
These are the guys outside of real estate who NAR should be getting to talk about this stuff. The real pros. By the same token, you will find that some of these folks would tell an audience why certain aspects of SM wont work in some niches. They are not going to sell the silver bullet, but explain how different bullets shot from different guns should be used on different prey (my apologies to the vegans in the crowd).
When I hear of agents spending close to $2k to someone to set up X # of SM profiles and a set of tapes to go with it, Im offended that these guys are so widely endorsed by the other so called experts in the field. Seriously, if you have to pay someone to set up a sm profile, what are the odds you will be successful with that?
I see huge value in learning from others outside my niche. It is where I developed my SEO skills. When you have people who compete and win in online spaces that are far more competitive (and by competitive I mean the level of skill you are going up against) than real estate, then you learn a ton. These guys are the Donald Trump of negotiating, the Warren Buffetts of investing, and the Barbara Corcorans of real estate brokers. I didnt see many of those types – the uber skilled. and successful like a Gregg Neumann – leading these sessions.
Condaleeza Rice is great, but Barbara Corcoran talking about taking $1000 and turning it into a $5 billion empire would have been worth the price of admission. That would have been educational and motivating.
At th end of the day I just want my industry back. I am tired of being told by those who dont do what we do why we are to stupid to see our imminent demise. They should be careful what they wish for as they are mostly just leeches who survive on the life blood of those very agents and brokers they think are clueless.