Showing posts with label Facebook Algorithm. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Facebook Algorithm. Show all posts

Thursday, May 3, 2018

How YOUR Social Media Platform Algorithms Work?


This is exactly how social media algorithms work today..



Each social media network has a unique set of technical elements, intricate logic, and usage analytics that make up the algorithm that delivers content to its users.

Seen in the fluctuation of social media algorithms in the past, the biggest consideration -- or debate -- is balancing personal relevance with post timeliness.

These algorithms are managed by dedicated teams of software engineers, data scientists, content strategists, and more, so nothing you see is an accident. Here's a look inside the criteria and priorities that Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn use to surface content and updates in users' personal feeds and search results -- and what it all means for your social media strategy.



Facebook Prioritizes Meaningful Interactions

Facebook's latest algorithm update, which they announced in January 2018, now puts posts -- that spark conversations and meaningful interactions between people -- at the top of your News Feed.

This means the content that receives the most engagement -- reactions, comments, and shares -- will be the highest.

Facebook keeps a historical account of your personal engagement with posts by friends and brand pages, and the Facebook News Feed algorithm also predicts what you want to see based on those past interactions with friends or brands.

Then, it aims to put similar posts upfront in your News Feed from the same people and pages and from those with relevant posts or profiles.



According to Facebook, it defines engaging content and "meaningful interactions" based on:

--Comment Activity: Back-and-forth comments on posts or a news article or video prompting lots of discussion
--Interactive Posts: Posts that you might want to share and react to, such as:
--A post from a friend looking for advice
--A friend asking for trip recommendations

As a marketer on Facebook, you should focus on engagement as the pathway to reach. Let Facebook's engagement metrics lead your measurement strategy: reactions, comments, and shares.

Although Facebook explicitly states that they will "show less public content, including videos and other posts from publishers or businesses," all hope is not lost for appearing in the Facebook News Feed. The more your page followers engage with your content, the more you will continue to appear in their feeds and the feeds of their friends.



Following the criteria above, create content and copy that triggers conversation—or even a healthy amount of controversy.

Facebook also calls out live video as a high-engagement format, getting six times as many interactions as normal videos.

Facebook admitted that with these changes, pages will likely start to see their overall reach, video viewing time, and referral traffic dip. However, pages that keep conversation going among friends will see less of a negative effect. Followers can also proactively choose to see page content first through the "See First" option instead of "Default" in your page's "Following" drop-down menu.

In its latest public announcement about Facebook Search in October 2015, Facebook explained its approach to search results. As you type in the search bar, Facebook predicts your complete search query in real-time, then includes posts and conversations shared publicly and from your friends' accounts.



Instagram Features Newest Posts First

After updating its feed algorithm in March 2016 to have "posts you care about most" appear first, Instagram reverted to a time-based feed in March 2018.

Why backtrack? Instagram states the change was the result of user feedback to make its feed "feel more fresh" through timely content. So it seems that while Instagram felt users would appreciate a more personalized feed based on interaction history, users actually care more about the most recent content.

To summarize the differences between the two updates:

--Relevancy Algorithm: Launched in March 2016, it reordered content in feeds based on the user's relationship (a.k.a. interaction history) with the person posting and the post's timeliness
--Recency Algorithm: Launched in March 2018, it places content in feeds based on each post's timeliness



Instagram's current time-based feed doesn't mean that post engagement isn't as important as before.

But it does mean that post times are more important to ensure your content appears in your followers' feeds at the ideal time.

While there might not be a silver bullet solution for the perfect distribution time, do pay attention to the peak engagement times (or time frames) of your followers—specifically to make the most of any action-oriented content.

Unlike its feed algorithm, Instagram's Search algorithm operates based on personal activity. The mix of photo, video, and story results depend on the people you follow and the posts you like. As your activity changes, so will your search results.



Twitter Puts Personal Relevance Before Timeliness

The current Twitter timeline algorithm, released in February 2016, places relevant tweets first based on your interaction history with the accounts you follow, presented in a section titled "In case you missed it."

These recommended tweets show up in reverse chronological order, meaning the most recent tweets appear first. The rest of the tweets that appear beneath them are also in reverse chronological order.

Twitter made this change so that you can "catch up on the best tweets from people you follow." Also, Twitter found that featured tweets get more live interaction to stimulate commentary and conversations.

Not a fan of Twitter's recommended tweets? You can also choose "See less often" right in your timeline or turn it off completely in your Settings by deselecting "Show me the best tweets first." So while your timeline defaults to personalization, you can have control over which you want to see first:



--Recommended Tweets: Tweets surfaced based on your personal interaction history
--Timely Tweets: Tweets surfaced based on post time in reverse chronological order, with the most recent posts appearing first

Of course, marketers aren't able to know the split of their own followers who do and don't use the recommended tweet timeline.

So when in doubt, optimize for engagement and time. It can only help to create interactive content and distribute it at the optimal times for engagement.

It's important to note that although Twitter's timeline is presented in reverse chronological order, the results of Twitter search are ordered according to relevance -- not time.



Twitter rolled out this search algorithm in December 2016 after much experimentation with balancing tweet and account results, managing the density of video and image results, and optimizing Twitter's machine learning model.

All testing had the goal of giving searchers diverse yet hyper-relevant results, using logic to tweak the relevance scoring and tweet positioning.

Twitter landed on the current search algorithm since the engineering team found that it yielded higher engagement, with people spending more time on Twitter and becoming more active.



LinkedIn Presents Updates by Individual Relevance

As of March 2018, LinkedIn's Feed algorithm focuses on understanding your individual preferences to give you relevant updates per visit. Upon every visitor session, the algorithm scans and ranks tens of thousands of posts in less than a second.

The thousands of signals used to present this content are grouped into three main categories:

--Personal Identity: Your individual LinkedIn profile, including your workplace, skills, and connections
--Content Engagement: The total views, total likes, update topic, post recency, language, and mentioned people or companies
--Personal Behavior: Your past likes and shares, interaction frequency, and time spent in your Feed



The overall mission of LinkedIn's Feed team is to help users be as productive and successful as possible.

Instead of evaluating relevance based on click-through rates, LinkedIn analyzes a variety of signals to measure your interest. These signals include time spent reading, insights from your LinkedIn social graph, and user experience research. Therefore, brand success on LinkedIn is largely determined by time spent with shared content, likes, and comments. Again, it seems that engagement is core to pleasing the algorithm.

Much like Facebook, LinkedIn's Search bar suggests search results as you type, whether for people, companies, or groups. For People searches specifically, LinkedIn's proprietary algorithm returns results through analysis of the searcher's activity and search history, resulting profiles, and other LinkedIn users who have performed similar searches.



What's It All Mean for Marketers?

With all the technical details considered, here's each social media network's default feed algorithm primary criterion (excluding custom user settings):

--Facebook: Relevance
--Instagram: Timeliness
--Twitter: Relevance
--LinkedIn: Relevance

Since relevance is the most common factor, let engagement metrics lead your social media strategy. Even though Instagram is all about post timing, you're more likely to appear in Instagram Search if your posts get a lot of likes and comments.

Guest Authored By Christine Warner. Christine is is a freelance writer and digital marketer with agency, brand, and non-profit experience developing integrated campaigns and content platforms for diverse brands such as Uber, Samsung, Walgreens, Victoria’s Secret, Dunkin’ Donuts, and Dignity Health. Her digital marketing specialties include content marketing strategy, customer relationship management, brand product marketing, digital media planning, social media marketing, and search engine optimization. Currently, she is the Senior Manager of Digital for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, where she oversees the digital marketing efforts for the various non-profit communities and ministries throughout Southern California. As a freelance writer, she contributes regularly to various lifestyle and marketing publications. Follow Christine on Twitter.





"This is the current state of social media algorithms, but you never know when the next optimization might come and change it all.

So follow each network's news and engineering blogs, and stay alert! -ChristineWarner


    • Post Crafted By:
      Fred Hansen Pied Piper of Social Media Marketing at YourWorldBrand.com & CEO of Millennium 7 Publishing Co. in Loveland, Colorado. I work deep in the trenches of social media strategy, community management and trends.  My interests include; online business educator, social media marketing, new marketing technology, skiing, hunting, fishing and The Rolling Stones..-Not necessarily in that order ;)
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    Location: Loveland, CO 80538, USA

    Wednesday, January 17, 2018

    How Facebook's Changes Impact YOUR Social Media Marketing?


    How Facebook's latest changes impact influencers and the future of social media marketing?

    Once again, Mark Zuckerberg shook up the world last week when he announced Facebook will change its algorithm to promote more personal content rather than news.



    Soon after my inbox was flooded with headlines like:

    Facebook Shares Fall”, “Facebook Is Changing”

    “Zuckerburg’s Net Worth Has Just Taken A 2.9 Billion Dollar Hit.”

    Since obsessing about Zuckerburg’s net worth has never yielded positive results for me, I instead called over our Social Media Strategist, Thomas Drew, to discuss the current social media environment. Our conclusion was this: What’s bad for businesses is good for Influencers. With new regulations on data (see GDPR) and less material from media outlets and businesses organically making Facebook users feeds, the stock of Social influencers will continue to rise. Let’s dive a little deeper to understand how this affects the full ecosystem, whether you’re a business, influencer, or marketer.

    The social landscape is a world in which businesses and brands are made ‘cool’ in a much shorter time period than we’re used to with traditional media. With the right strategy, Influencer partnerships, and tactics, you can move the needle for your business on far more than just sales and engagement. Companies like Aesthetic Revolution, GymShark, and Daniel Wellington are multi-million dollar businesses built from leveraging Instagram tactics, Influencer partnerships, and flawless sales funnels. On the other hand, Social is also a place where fake news can get the most shares and engagement, especially on Facebook. In an effort to curb this, Zuckerberg is willing to risk short-term user engagement on his platform for more interactions with friends and family.



    Since Instagram’s algorithm is beginning to mirror Facebook’s more and more, expect to see more organic content from people, and less from brands and businesses in 2018.

    What must be noted during this change is that Influencers are, and have always been people first, and content marketers second. Every influencer, no matter what the niche, has their own content style that, for whatever reason, resonated with their audience and caused that audience to explode. These influencers and their audiences will garner even more attention with their organic content, while similar, non-paid content from businesses and brands will suffer.

    This isn’t the first time Facebook has radically shifted its model. So what does all this mean for Influencers, Business and the Future of Social Media?

    I remember when Instagram and Facebook were chronological. You followed people to see their content, and that content was shown to you in the order that it was meant to be seen. Strategies were less complicated, control was with the user, and all was good within the social world. Then BOOM! The infamous ‘algorithm’ of late 2016 hit.



    Facebook and Instagram limited your reach to 30% of your total follower count on average, allowed the algorithm to decide what content should be displayed in your feed, and Social Media was forever changed.

    Free flowing content turned into regulated content, and the reach of business profiles were reduced, causing them to pay for ads just so their content could be seen.

    What’s next? — Even less organic media content, which will hurt the companies that aren't familiar with best practices in Influencer Marketing. Thomas Drew said, “I expect more paid ads, less organic posts from brands, and more Influencer Marketing partnerships with Mega, Micro, and Nano Influencers.”

    All facets of the marketing ecosystem will be impacted.



    1. Influencers Stock Just Got a Big Boost

    If you’re an Influencer, you just leveled up even further. Connecting with Influencers who have a growing audience that they truly understand will be at a premium for most marketers. It will continue to be the most effective way to influence consumer behavior via social media and beyond.

    The key is for Influencers to have a deep understanding of their followers and of their brands equity.

    The real question is, will Facebook begin to regulate Influencers and treat their organic content the same as businesses? Will they use the algorithm to measure the amount of posts from Influencers that seem to contain brands either in the content or caption and begin to penalize their reach just like the media companies and businesses? After all, Influencers began their accounts as regular people, connecting with friends and family and not partnering with brands. Time will tell.



    2. Businesses Must Adjust to a New Marketing Ecosystem

    Companies that rely on Facebook and Instagram to build businesses are definitely at a loss with the changes, but there is still hope. For most businesses, it will be as simple as understanding what the ambition of your brand or product is and aligning that with the target consumer that has a similar ambition.

    The good thing about social media is that with the right data and proper social listening, you can unearth your target audience and figure out which Influencer speaks to them. Picking an Influencer that has a lot of followers in your niche, telling them to post your brand or product, and tagging your account isn't Influencer Marketing. The best way to utilize an Influencer’s audience is to understand your objective, learn about the factors that influence your target audience, and activate an Influencer that blends your brand or product narrative seamlessly within their own. I call that “equity match making.” That’s when you get comments like, “This is the best ad I’ve ever seen!” or “This should be on TV,” while satisfying your objective and growing your business. That’s the Holy Grail of Influencer Marketing.



    3. The Future of Social Media Marketing Depends on How Zuckerberg Chooses to Regulate Influencers

    In order to stop the spread of fake content, Facebook has decided to show you less business and media content, and more “people content” — content from the individual users. But if businesses execute even more influencer marketing through these individuals that are Influencers, where will they draw the line? Will they regulate that as well?

    These questions will be answered over the next few months, but one thing is for sure: Facebook will find a way to increase shareholder value and it’s going to come at the expense of brands.

    Guest Authored By Keenan Beasley. Keenan is the co-founder of BLKBOX, an integrated marketing agency based in New York City. He is a graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point. Follow Keenan on Twitter.





    "The main takeaway in all this is that the power is in the hands of the Influencer more than ever before.." -KeenanBeasley


      • Authored by:
        Fred Hansen Pied Piper of Social Media Marketing at YourWorldBr@nd.com & CEO of Millennium 7 Publishing Co. in Loveland, CO  where I work deep in the trenches of social media strategy, community management and trends.  My interests include; online business educator, social media marketing, new marketing technology, skiing, hunting, fishing and The Rolling Stones..-Not necessarily in that order ;)
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      Location: Loveland, CO 80538, USA
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