Facebook shows each person only the posts it expects them to care about. Post less often and better, invite real replies, and move anything customers rely on to your website and email list.

Fewer people seeing each post

Under each post on a Facebook page, the page's managers can see how many people it reached. For many pages that number has been falling since December, while the count of people who like the page holds steady.

Owners notice it in other ways too. Regulars mention that they never see the page any more, and a post about a closure or a new product reaches only part of the people it was meant for.

Nothing is broken. Facebook is choosing, for each person, which page posts to show, and it is showing fewer of them.

Businesses that built their following on Facebook feel this most, because the page was where all their news went.

Why Facebook filters

Every time someone opens Facebook, far more posts are waiting from friends, groups and liked pages than anyone could read. Facebook ranks them and shows the ones it predicts each person will care about most.

As more pages post more often, competition for each place in the News Feed grows, and a page's post must earn its spot against a friend's holiday photographs.

Liking a page once is a weak signal. What counts more is what each person has done lately: whether they commented on, shared, clicked or liked the page's recent posts.

What the ranking seems to weigh

Facebook does not publish its formula, and it adjusts it often. These signals, though, have been described often enough to work with:

Together they mean that a page's reach is earned post by post, and that a run of ignored posts makes the next one harder to see.

Posts that still reach people

Posts that start a real conversation travel furthest. A question customers want to answer, a photograph of something new that day, a short note from the owner: these draw comments and shares.

Facebook reads that response as a reason to show the post to more of the page's fans, and to show the page's next post to the people who responded.

Posts that repeat the same graphic daily or exist only to sell draw little response, and each one teaches the ranking that your posts are easy to skip.

A few good posts a week give each one room to gather responses before the next arrives.

Paying to reach your own fans

Facebook will show a post to more of your fans, and to their friends, for a fee. For an event or a sale that matters, that can be sensible, and you set the budget.

It is still attention rented on someone else's terms. When the payment stops, so does the extra reach, and the next post starts from the same place.

Before paying, make sure the post is one people would respond to anyway. Paying to show a dull post mostly shows it to more people who ignore it.

A worked example

A seaside doughnut shop makes a dozen flavours a day from a rotating list, and for three years had posted each morning's flavours on its Facebook page as a designed graphic.

Over the winter, customers kept telling the staff they had not seen a post in weeks. Page Insights showed each morning's graphic reaching a small share of the page's fans, with hardly any likes or comments.

The graphic looked the same every day, so few people responded, and each quiet post made the next one less likely to be shown. Regulars who never interacted had stopped seeing the page at all.

The daily list moved to a page on the website that staff update from a phone each morning, and the shop began a weekly email of next week's specials, with sign-up cards by the cash register.

The Facebook page now posts a few times a week: a new flavour coming out of the fryer, or a question about which old flavour to bring back. Posts like those invite answers.

Today's list is now on the website whatever Facebook shows, and the posts that do appear give fans something to answer.

What you own and what you rent

Facebook decides who sees your posts, how your page looks and what the rules are, and can change any of them. The page is useful, but it is not yours.

Your website is where the complete, current facts belong: hours, menu or products, prices, location and news. A post can point to it, but should never be the only place to find something.

Your email list goes to each subscriber's inbox rather than through a ranking, though spam filters and Gmail's tabs still apply. It is the channel where you choose who hears from you.

Moving fans to the list

Ask fans to join the email list, with a clear description of what they will get and how often. Put the sign-up on the website, mention it on the page now and then, and offer it at the counter.

Be specific: next week's specials every Thursday, or new flavours first. A vague newsletter is easy to ignore; a useful one is easy to say yes to.

The counter-case

For some businesses, Facebook works well. A page whose fans comment and share every week will keep reaching them, and some customers genuinely prefer to hear from a business there.

Those pages should keep posting, and paying now and then to reach further is reasonable. Nothing here argues for leaving Facebook.

The point is only where the important things live. Whatever reach a page has today, nobody else can turn down your website or your email list.

Working with a smaller reach

  1. Check Page Insights for the reach of each post.
  2. Move daily facts to a page on your website.
  3. Post less often, with something worth stopping for.
  4. Ask questions customers genuinely want to answer.
  5. Reply to comments the same day.
  6. Invite fans to join your email list.
  7. Pay to promote only the posts that matter.

Step two removes the risk. Once hours, menus and announcements live on your own site, a post that reaches few people is a missed chance rather than a customer left uninformed.

Social posts that are only a picture of words explains why the details of a post belong in its text rather than inside a designed graphic, where screen readers cannot reach them.

Frequently asked questions

Why are fewer fans seeing my Facebook posts?

Facebook ranks the posts waiting for each person and shows the ones it expects them to care about. As competition grows, page posts with little response reach fewer fans.

Did liking my page mean fans would see every post?

No. A like is a weak signal. Recent interaction counts for more, so fans who never comment, share or click gradually see less of the page.

Which page posts still reach people?

Posts that draw real responses: questions customers want to answer, photographs of something new, short notes from the owner. Repeated graphics and constant selling draw little.

Should I pay to promote posts?

For an event or sale that matters, it can be sensible. The extra reach stops when the payment stops, so keep the important facts on your own site.

Why does the website matter if I have a Facebook page?

Facebook controls who sees your posts and can change its rules. Your website holds the complete, current facts, and nobody else decides who can see them.

How do I move fans to an email list?

Ask them, with a specific promise such as next week's specials every Thursday, and offer the sign-up on your website, on the page and at the counter.

West Coast Media Solutions Inc. provides web design, web development, hosting, digital marketing, and business consulting to organisations across Canada, drawing on more than twenty-five years in the field.

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