Facebook To Significantly Reduce Promotional Content in The News Feed From January 2015

[engine]

It looks as if Facebook is raising a flag an and ending the promotional ride even further.

According to people we surveyed, there are some consistent traits that make organic posts feel too promotional:

Posts that solely push people to buy a product or install an app

Posts that push people to enter promotions and sweepstakes with no real context

Posts that reuse the exact same content from ads
Facebook To Significantly Reduce Promotional Content in The News Feed From January [facebook.com]

Beginning in January 2015, people will see less of this type of content in their News Feeds. As we’ve said before, News Feed is already a competitive place — as more people and Pages are posting content, competition to appear in News Feed has increased. All of this means that Pages that post promotional creative should expect their organic distribution to fall significantly over time.

[dcheney]

Hmm, call me cynical, but isn't it nice they'll leave it the same through the big holiday selling season.

[IanKelley]

If they really wanted to cash in they would implement it immediately. This is about organic posts which make them no money directly. Were they to penalize spammy organic posts before the holiday season, it would push marketers to paid options.

Now if they can just figure out how to identify clickbait!

[engine]

They already hit those with pages that had been "liked," but it seems it's going further.

I have found it a frustration having "liked" something specific that i don't see the news from that service in the feed. I have specifically "liked" it, so why not let me see the feed. I can unlike it if it's just a spam-fest. Facebook: Let the user decide.

Marketers will have to ask whether Facebook is worthwhile from the organic point of view.

Added
Anybody Else Struggling with Facebook? [webmasterworld.com]
Facebook Tweaks Newsfeed Algo To Show More Timely Stories from Friends and Pages [webmasterworld.com]

[Panthro]

I have found it a frustration having "liked" something specific that i don't see the news from that service in the feed. I have specifically "liked" it, so why not let me see the feed. I can unlike it if it's just a spam-fest. Facebook: Let the user decide.

This. I do not understand their reasoning in keeping out content that I WANT in my feed.

[7_Driver]

I think Facebook is currently marginal for us - but just about worthwhile to build a "tribe".

I was planning to spend some money building our audience - but I'm not sure if the proposed changes will reduce our reach even further - so Facebook spending is on hold until we see what happens.

Starting to think Pinterest is going to be a better source of traffic than Facebook very soon.

[rj87uk]

I agree if I liked something it should show up in my feed I now have to specifically like something and then hover over the like button and click "Get Notifications".

[SmallP]

I actually had an (angry) direct message on my website's Facebook page earlier this week, asking me why they were no longer getting my posts and what was I going to do about it!

People "like" my page so that they can be notified when I add new content to my website. I suppose if they are no longer seeing the posts then I am promising them something and not delivering.

[SmallP]

Another thought. There must be a huge divide between:

- Type 1 people, who use Facebook as an RSS feed to receive info on people/companies/services/websites that they are interested in, updating their feeds as their interests change, and

- Type 2 people who "like" every corporate page that they see on the internet, enter every competition, get angry when they are fed 1500 "promotional" posts a day from "spammy" corporates, and don't know how to hit the "unlike" or "hide" button to get rid of those posts.

When I read through the recent decisions from Facebook it seems that the world consists only of type 2 people. Really?

It seems to me that Facebook is throwing out the baby with the bath water. There's no distinction between "company pages" from huge corporates with advertising budgets to spend, and small "company pages" like your child's preschool, your local Farmer's Market or Theatre Company, your gym or village sports club etc. It's the addition of posts from that sort of service/company that makes my personal Facebook page interesting and useful for me to look at. If I'm not seeing them, will I bother to visit as much?

For the small "company pages", returning to email is going to much more efficent in the future.

[David_SEO]

If we see the increasing features rather than the reducing features, then we feel Facebook is awesome! I liked it's "Say Thanks"(a personalized video creation tool) feature very much.

[teresa005]

do the social media marketing is all ppl do. But have anyone think about the promotion with some small gifts? Such as a shirt, a pocket calendar, a small notepad etc. I think ppl more like those useful & free things.