To Maximize Facebook Reach, Share Links The Right Way
When it comes to social media, the rules for engagement are constantly in flux.
So it should come as no surprise to hear that Facebook has released a new “News Feed FYI” outlining its algorithm’s treatment of click-bait headlines and best practices for link-sharing.
Will The Facebook Algorithm Put An End To Click-Bait?
In its continual quest for greater content relevancy, Facebook has taken a strong stance against “click-bait” with its August 2014 algorithm adjustment.
So, what constitutes click-bait? Well, it’s another of those “you know when you see it” categories. Here’s Facebook’s example:
Facebook defines click-bait as “when a publisher posts a link with a headline that encourages people to click to see more, without telling them much information about what they will see.”
By enticing more users to click, these posts gamify their way to inflated reach within the News Feed — and Facebook (and Facebook users) are sick of it.
According to Facebook’s research, a whopping 80% of users preferred headlines “that helped them decide if they wanted to read the full article before they had to click through.”
So how does Facebook plan to right this click-baiting wrong?
Well, their evaluative criteria is not all that dis-similar to how you might measure the success (or failure) of a first date: the time spent and willingness to talk about it afterwards.
Or, as Facebook put it:
“With this update we will start taking into account whether people tend to spend time away from Facebook after clicking a link, or whether they tend to come straight back to News Feed when we rank stories with links in them.
Another factor we will use to try and show fewer of these types of stories is to look at the ratio of people clicking on the content compared to people discussing and sharing it with their friends. If a lot of people click on the link, but relatively few people click Like, or comment on the story when they return to Facebook, this also suggests that people didn’t click through to something that was valuable to them.”
The bottom line? Quality counts. If you have to trick people into clicking, then that probably speaks to the quality of your content, and the Facebook algorithm is taking note.
To Maximize Facebook Reach, Share Links (The Right Way)
In tandem with the campaign against click-bait, Facebook announced that it will prioritize posts that share links via the default link format, rather than links shared as photo captions or status updates.
Confused by that nuance? Take a look at the differences below in the examples Facebook provided:
Default Link Format
Link As Photo Caption
Notice the difference? According to Facebook, the default link format offers greater context to users, allowing for a more informed answer to the new-age, News Feed query: to click, or not to click?
From now on, social media marketers will be wise to heed Facebook’s advice regarding link-posting best practices:
“The best way to share a link after these updates will be to use the link format. In our studies, these posts have received twice as many clicks compared to links embedded in photo captions. In general, we recommend that you use the story type that best fits the message that you want to tell – whether that’s a status, photo, link or video.”
For the full scoop on these latest Facebook algorithm changes, read the full blog post from the Facebook News Room.
Want more Facebook marketing tips? Get your copy of The Marketing Maven’s Guide To Facebook!
Kara Burney is the Content Marketing Maven at TrackMaven, the Competitive Intelligence platform for Digital Marketers. Have content marketing questions or topics you'd like covered on the TrackMaven blog? Tweet her your ideas! See more of Kara's posts
