September 18, 2019

If you’re a social media manager or business owner who runs a Facebook account, chances are you’ve noticed a fairly steep drop in how much “Reach” your posts are getting when they aren’t “Boosted” by ads. This drop in organic reach is something social media managers have been discussing, complaining and dissecting since the early 2010’s (see chart below).

Chart courtesy of Neil Patel.

Even with these numbers I was still fairly optimistic. I didn’t think organic reach was totally dead yet and even wrote a blog discussing how to outsmart Facebook and get some of that organic reach back. As I revisit the situation today, I’m sad to say that I think organic reach is all but dead – here are my thoughts.

“Pages Feed” Tab in Navigation Removed

Back in 2012, Facebook made changes to the way personal News Feeds operated by moving most posts by business pages to a separate tab called “Pages Feed” (see photo below). This change led to a steep drop in organic post reach as most business page posts were filtered into a tab which no one used. In fact, most people didn’t even realize Facebook had made the change and wondered where all the posts from the pages they previously followed went.

Photo courtesy of Search Engine Journal.

Fast forward to earlier this year, when Facebook very quietly removed the “Pages Feed” tab from the navigation all together. Some Facebook users have left messages in the support form asking where the tab went with little to no response from Facebook. A clear sign that organic reach is in trouble.

Business Posts Have Disappeared from News Feeds

Once I noticed the “Pages Feed” tab had disappeared, I had hoped that perhaps Facebook would begin showing me posts from pages I follow in my main News Feed again, sadly I was wrong. Outside of the pages I manage, I don’t follow very many business, entertainment or sports pages and I don’t even have more than 400 personal Facebook friends so you would think posts from the pages I do follow would have a lot of opportunity to appear in my News Feed – not the case. While researching for this blog, I visited 4 of the pages I follow and clicked on the post tab, sure enough each of the 4 pages had 10+ posts over the last 3 months that had never appeared in my News Feed. These were pages that I had never marked as “Unfollow” or “Hide Posts”, these were pages I once “Liked” that just simply do not show up in my feed anymore.

Why don’t they show up in my feed? Probably something to do with the Facebook algorithm which is on its own determining what to show and not show in my feed based on my past engagement. Unless you Like, Comment or Share posts from the pages you follow on a regular basis, chances are you won’t see them in your main News Feed – possibly ever.

Reach on Hyperlink Posts Down Compared to Other Posts

If you run a Facebook business page, chances are you’re occasionally sharing links back to your website. Something I’ve noticed over the past 18-24 months is how quickly the organic reach of these types of posts has dropped – especially when compared to other post types (photos, videos, text). This is especially true if the hyperlink uses the Facebook “Card Format”. Here’s an example from one of the pages I manage:

The photo below is the organic reach of a hyperlink post using the “Card Format”:

This photo is the organic reach of a simple photo post:

Notice the significant difference in organic post reach? Granted, the second photo does have more engagement which would lead to more organic reach, but the numbers just don’t add up. My thought is that because the hyperlink takes users “away” from Facebook, Facebook “punishes” the post and keeps the organic reach low. Facebook doesn’t want people leaving their ecosystem so posts which include simple photos, text or video (uploaded directly to Facebook) will always receive more reach. Which I suppose is fine as long as you never want to share a hyperlink on your Facebook business page again (insert eye roll emoji).

Facebook Pushing Ads Every Chance They Get

The final sign for me that organic reach is all but dead is the amount of spots within Facebook (both personal and business), that encourage you to “Promote Your Page”. Just look at the screenshot below, in this one screenshot I counted 5 (FIVE?!) call-2-action links in which Facebook is encouraging the setup of advertising. What this screenshot doesn’t include is the number of emails, notifications and even personal News Feed posts which also put a heavy emphasis on advertising your business page on Facebook.

When I add up all these factors I can’t help but think that the days of high organic reach are a thing of the past. Facebook for business is now “Pay to Play” and given their monthly active user numbers and targeting options – it’s hard not to recommend creating a social media advertising budget.