This week’s advice column is all about Facebook.
A majority of people have a Facebook account. Some people are a bit more vocal and active than others, and some are very quiet and only have a profile so that their wife can have someone to be married to (ahem, like Randy). I originally got an account when MySpace was in its height of popularity because my friend Ryan said it was “cooler.” I got hooked after about a year. That was in 2006.
Flash forward to 2010, when I became an official business and got myself a fan page – back when they were CALLED fan pages. Everyone who was a fan was able to see my work. Mind you – it was only a couple hundred people – but still, 100% visibility. Everyone could see what I was posting, sharing and offering. And it worked – it worked really well. People couldn’t post on my page or like a photo unless they were a fan, which helped me grow as a business. And I am forever grateful for that beautiful, brief moment in time.
Flash forward to 2013 – and boy has Facebook changed. My photography businesses have skyrocketed with popularity – and a large part of that is due to Facebook. I have been able to keep up my Facebook business pages (no longer a fan page), and it’s worked.
Well, sort of.
See – here is the thing. Facebook used to be this hip online social media hang out platform … And now it’s a money hungry, ad-filled machine that sucks a little bit out of my soul every time I look at my “insights” (analytics for Facebook).
Last night on my boudoir page posted about the upcoming Boudoir marathon we are hosting and it was shown to 64 people. Out of 2,612. That’s about 2.5% of my fan base for boudoir.
And that is ridiculous.
Now, you might say – but Ash, why don’t you do the paid sponsored ads?
Well, that would be because they don’t work. The first time I did it, I got a whole bunch of new likes from Saudi Arabia. I thought, hmm, maybe it was a fluke or I did it wrong? Nope. The next time I did it I got maybe 7 new fans and zero inquiries for the specific ad I was running.
To say I was disappointed is putting it kindly. Why? Because even with my paid ads, it still wasn’t showing up to my nearly 3,000 fans – at best, it was showing up to 50% of them.
I won’t run an ad again. It just doesn’t work.
So here is my suggestion to Facebook … Quit with this paid ad crap. Allow businesses to pay an affordable monthly advertising premium – and have our stuff show up in people’s newsfeed. If people choose to like our page and then choose the “don’t show in newsfeed” option – that’s one thing. But if people like our page, generally speaking that means they want to see what we are offering and it’s unfair to them – the Facebook masses – to miss out on what we are posting. I can’t tell you how many times I have heard “oh man, I had no idea you had x,y,z sale going on – it didn’t show up in my newsfeed!”
… That sucks, Facebook. Like, for realsies.
I am utterly grateful that Facebook is free right now, but to me – it would be worth it to pay a little bit each month as a business expense and have my posts show up. I know the new algorithm says that if you post interesting stuff, your posts will start showing up in people’s newsfeeds.
That’s a bald face lie. Outright lie.
I have plenty of interaction – dozens of image likes and comments … And still, at best without paid ads only 1/4 to 1/3 of my fans see it.
So … If you have made it this far, bless you. I am going to be working on starting a newsletter that will go out to those who sign up for it once a month, and it will go directly to your email. It will have all upcoming sales, links to blog posts, and important info that Facebook hides from you. I will be working on getting that started this week, so keep your eyes peeled! This will be brought to you by MailChimp – which I will blog about once I have figured out how to do it! 🙂
Until next time … xoxo!
You’re totally right. I have 800 fans, and only about 300 of them see my posts. Even when an image gets tons of likes and comments, I only get 500 views. Not even from the fans.
Ugh.
this is so dead on!