Facebook doesn’t make life easy for everyone. Facebook statistics can make it seem like you’re a 90s emo child, despite all the family drama and political posts.

So. Much. Angst.

Many business owners struggle with declining engagement and a shrinking reach week by week. They are unable to identify the root cause.

How can we get our posts on Facebook in front of our audience? How can we avoid paying Facebook?

Why your Facebook reach is so low right now

It’s not just you. For the past couple of years, reach has been in steady decline for businesses. This is especially true since Facebook moved from Edgerank into the machine learning algorithm.

On average, Facebook’s reach has dropped to just 6%. This means that out of 100 people who follow you on Facebook, only six will see your content.

You can increase your reach by posting boosted Facebook posts. This is not organic.

Facebook should limit the reach of pages to some extent. The average Facebook user in the U.S. follows 70 pages. This would cause their feed to be overcrowded by the volume of content they receive from brands.

The financial side is also important. Facebook is a publicly traded, for-profit business. More than 18 million pages are competing for users’ attention. Businesses that experience a decrease in organic reach are more likely to invest in sponsored posts and ad content.

Jay Baer, Convince and Convert’s designer, did a great mashup graphic showing declining Facebook reach and rising Facebook stock prices back in 2014.

Facebook’s Reach Decisions Right Now

This one is easy to master and you will make a lot of cash.

There is no clear answer. This frustrates both marketers and business owners. The ranking and reaching process is very complicated, I can tell you that.

Facebook uses more than 100,000 factors to determine what shows up in a user’s newsfeed.

This means that you might have to try a different type of content. It is also possible that your post timing may not be optimal.

It will.

We know that visibility and reach are affected by a few weights, including the fact the original Edgerank algorithm was not replaced. It was incorporated into the new algorithm. These factors are still very important.

• Affinity is your relationship with your followers, and how they interact with your brand.
• Weight – Different content types are weighted differently. Facebook gives visual content more weight.
• Decay – Older posts are less likely to appear in the feed. 

Other factors can also play a role, such as:

• Follower’s bandwidth available
• Facebook ads user interaction
• What types of content are most popular with the user (photo, text or native video? Live video?)
• What types of posts are reported as spam or hidden by the user?

PostRocket shared this infographic, which explains Facebook’s algorithm (Edgerank) and included this great piece.

Facebook doesn’t want to limit publishers’ reach to get them to buy ads or boost content.

Brian Boland, Facebook’s Vice President of Advertising Technology, cites two main reasons for the decline in organic reach.

1. Facebook shares over 3 million links per hour, which means that there is a lot of content being sent out to your followers.
2. Facebook wants to make users’ experience better and show them the most useful content to increase engagement. Only the most important, quality stories (300+) will appear in a user’s news feed.

Brian’s advice for publishers was straightforward:

“Publish great content. Content that teaches, entertains, makes people think, or adds value to their life in any other way.”

This sounds very similar to the content marketing drumbeats we have been beating.

Even more fascinating is the suggestion that we should stop worrying about organic reach, and instead concentrate on other business objectives through our Facebook pages. What do you mean? Perhaps driving in-store sales, opting-ins, or video traffic.

This shouldn’t be a disappointment. You should still strive for reach, as you want more people to see your content. This is how you keep them engaged.

Before we go into how to increase your reach organically without spending money on Facebook advertising, I want to cover some things you shouldn’t do.

1. Automating is not the best strategy. This is a social network and you must give the impression of having a human touch. Varietate your posts and share different content with your audience. It’s important to make sure that your posts are not just scheduled links.
2. Do more than just promote your products and services. Facebook is built on interest and not the intent. The 80/20 rule is a good guideline. Your updates should consist of 80% social media content and 20% promotional.

Your promotional content should be engaging and not sell anything.

• Do not throw your best practices to the wind – Never buy likes on Facebook. It is a wasteful use of your time. This will result in a drop in engagement. Don’t bombard your followers with useless updates or clickbait content. Spammers are being punished by Facebook.

How to organically grow your reach without spending a dime

1. Find the best time for you to publish your content.

There is a lot of data available about the best times to post on Facebook. Follow the data, but don’t follow the crowd. Your audience is your audience. Just as they are each unique, so are they.

Take this data as a guideline and start to experiment with your content plan. You can test, retest, and then again.

Try posting in the evenings, when users are not online. Your posts will be more likely to appear in the feeds of your audience if there isn’t much being shared.

Jon Loomer tried this theory out on his Facebook page. He compared posts made during peak hours (6 am-3 pm) and content posted during off hours (10 pm-3 am). He also tracked the performance and differences in content.

In all cases, his reach was greater in the evenings.

This has a potential benefit and is a huge one. If you can increase engagement with off-hours content overnight your content will likely be at the top news feed for users when their morning comes and they check their feeds.

2. Ask your followers questions to increase engagement.

Facebook should have one goal: to create a network of people who can feed off each other, communicate back, and share.

Engaging questions is a great way to achieve that. Do not promote links or add value.

Just ask a question. Every customer wants to hear their opinion. They should be heard.

Ask your fans for their opinions, thoughts, memories, and goals.

Your questions should be simple and easy to understand. Keep your questions relevant to the lifestyle of the person asking them. Also, monitor feedback to ensure you can comment and engage.

As your post starts appearing in the feeds of others, the more you get responses, the greater the reach.

3. Embed your Facebook posts. 

Facebook might be decreasing organic reach for all users on their platform, but if your blog is active then they have an audience that can’t touch you. This is especially true for content marketers who are bringing in lots of traffic.

Combine your content marketing and your Facebook content to increase your reach.

You can embed your Facebook posts to your blog to increase visibility for the content you want to promote. This is a great way for new users to find you and increase your engagement.

It is also very easy to do.

To embed a blog post, click on the drop-down Arrow in the upper-right corner. Click “Embed” to copy the code into your blog.

4. One type of content is a favorite among fans.

This is not about giveaways or freebies.

Transparency is what I am referring to.

People love transparency.

Transparency can be a powerful engagement tool as it allows you to show your audience what’s happening behind closed doors. Transparency can be more educational than regular content in some cases.

Transparency is possible and you have a few options:

• You should post something personal and unique that demonstrates the humanity behind your brand.

That’s it. There’s only one way.

Buffer followed this route and shared photos from a trip that they took with their South African team.

They were amazed at the results they achieved by sharing this transparent content.

You don’t have to go back into manufacturing or show images and videos of your team. Sometimes, your followers simply want to learn more about you and see what you are like.

Today’s top marketers know that transparency is important to their followers.

They share videos and photos that feature them to help their fans stay connected.

Arnold Schwarzenegger has been a shaming machine with his engagement. He regularly posts videos and pictures of himself working on his #comewithmeifyouwanttolift campaign. He ran a campaign to promote his shirts and decided to give a treat to some of his fans by calling them personally to say thanks during a live stream.

Engagement and reach were unmatched.

Arnold is a celebrity. But that doesn’t mean you won’t be able to get the same reach and engagement if you take the same approach to transparency and outreach with your followers.

5. Respond to comments

This is something that I find absurd.

You have spent a lot of time building a community, sharing content, and growing your brand via social media. You have an audience who takes the time to comment on your pages, despite their busy schedules.

You don’t reply to their comments.

These are your most loyal fans. They are looking for a reply. This makes them feel valued and validates their interest.

Zero responses mean that you are telling them they are not worth your time.

This could cause a chain reaction in which other users will not see your reply. So why bother commenting? They won’t engage you.

Despite being constantly busy, I still manage to respond to hundreds of comments each day on different social media channels.

Commenting increases engagement and engagement improve reach.

Conclusion

You desire more organic reach on Facebook.

So do I.

So does everyone.

What can you do to make your expectations realistic? Keep your expectations realistic. Facebook is the owner of Facebook and can alter your organic reach at any time they wish.

You don’t have to play by the rules. However, you do have the ability to think strategically. Find out what your followers love, then feed them the things they need. Keep it real.

You may not curate a frenetic mess of frothing-at-the-mouth fans on Facebook like you could a few years ago, but you should still be using Facebook to improve your brand, grow your business, and build a tribe.