If you are the administrator of Pages you’ve possibly noticed that at some point earlier this week, the growth of your Facebook Page began decreasing (or at least the average reach of each of your Page’s feed stories). The reason appears to be that Facebook has decreased the overall weight of Facebook Pages in the feed. We believe that this may have been a result of the introduction of Facebook Places which has become prominently displayed within user feeds since it launched on Wednesday evening.
After looking at the growth of the top Facebook Pages we’ve noticed that on the 18th (the day that Facebook Places was launched), Facebook Page growth dropped by over 50 percent on average. This is a dramatic change which will surely effect all Facebook Page administrators. While much of the Facebook Page growth experienced by organizations and individuals is accomplished through advertising and other forms of promotions, Facebook Page growth was also a result of organic growth.
Every time a user commented on a feed story, the likelihood that the story would be displayed in other users’ feeds increased. That’s why many Page administrators have invested a significant amount of effort into increasing on-Page engagement. Granted, Facebook does not guarantee any amount of organic growth, however major changes in the feed algorithm can have a dramatic impact. This form of change is akin to Google changing their Page Rank algorithm.
However the primary difference here is that it doesn’t appear as though any Page administrators have benefitted from this change. In contrast, for every Google Page Rank algorithm adjustment tends to increase exposure for some sites while simultaneously decreasing the exposure for others. The only conclusion we can derive as of right now is that Facebook adjusted the company’s feed algorithm to increase the priority of Facebook Places stories at the expense of Facebook Pages.
We’ve reached out to Facebook for more information and will be sure to update the post if we hear back from them. I’ve also posted an image below of a chart of the growth of the official Facebook Page and how it changed. You can view more charts for comparison via our Facebook Page statistics area. Have you seen a similar decrease in your Facebook Page story impressions?
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Wow, no wonder all my pages have been disappearing from my feeds. I'm trying to figure out why Facebook is making changes, because it certainly doesn't seem to be about enhancing the average user's experience.
Comment by Sam — August 21, 2010 @ 9:00 am
Facebook needs to take into consideration people rather than itself more often, this applies to the privacy setting debacle as well.
Comment by Ray Clark — August 21, 2010 @ 9:09 am
This is very disheartening. My page I'm Not Right In The Head.com was exploding recently, and then several days ago just slowed down dramatically. I thought it was the fact that everyone was on Holiday, but that's clearly not the case. I have worked tirelessly to build momentum and now I'm being told that facebook has done something to slow this? I'm feeling sick to my stomach right now.
Comment by mark cacciatore — August 21, 2010 @ 9:52 am
Sorry, the page wasn't letting me authenticate.
So, am I to assume that facebook is not propogating feeds from pages as much? I thought all posts got propogated.
Comment by Mike Grady — August 21, 2010 @ 10:38 am
dfg
Comment by Mike Grady — August 21, 2010 @ 2:36 pm
this is something that will not only reflect on end users.
this is another roadblock for any " solid expectations " in f-commerce.
we have to speculate on something !!!
don't pull out the rug from under our feet , we are budget centric, especially when it comes to social commerce right now..
we cant even speculate based on statistics anymore and ROI is a tight game for a thin budget line .
many of us have limits for experimenting and try to make this platform approach in to a much thicker line using solid , stat. based techques.
hint-hint ,
keep your eyes on fb ppc and how it benefits.
a clear picture appears real fast , just my personal opinion for now.
less engagement ? yes ! the answer is in 3 little letters? _________ <— you know it !
Comment by robert vayner — August 22, 2010 @ 5:24 am
I have been very frustrated this past few days, trying a lot of things, varying the time of day, etc. It's just another example of how little control we have as Page owners over our marketing on Facebook. At least w/Google, we can use good SEO practices and provide great content to increase impressions.
Hope this is resolved soon!
Comment by Betsy Kent — August 22, 2010 @ 5:40 am
ha ha (in Nelson from Simpsons tone :p)
Comment by John Lee Blackwell — August 22, 2010 @ 10:12 am
FB is a dictator with little regard for its loyal subjects. I hope once again the users can protest as they did regarding the last bad decision FB made with respect to fan pages–and get them to see both sides.
Comment by Melinda Stone — August 22, 2010 @ 5:39 pm
My impressions per post has more than halved and my page has almost 90,000 fans. If we can't use the newsfeed to communicate with our fans, what other benefits are there in using FB Pages?
Really not happy with Facebook once again….
Comment by Nicholas — August 22, 2010 @ 5:57 pm
Interesting, though I haven't noticed much effect either in my stats or personal news feed.
Comment by Caitlin Fitzsimmons — August 23, 2010 @ 9:54 am
A fan kindly linked me to your excellent article and all of a sudden I got that sinking feeling… We all work extremely hard to maintain our critical mass of fans and for Farce Book (not a typo) to just negate all of that hard work almost overnight is disgraceful. My fan base went from 2000 (a figure I've busted my b*lls to get to) to 1100 overnight… What's worse than all of this? None of them have the nuts to be contactable. They hide behind no.reply emails, they don't have a contact number… they don't even reply to the only chance you might have of some form of contact – bug reports… Anyone know of an alternative to this Orwellian website – North Korea has more accountability than this place…
Comment by Paul Williams Imagin — August 23, 2010 @ 12:52 pm
Facebook are a commercial organisation. They have their strategy and make decisions as they see fit.
I don't see why there's an expectation they should do what we want. We're not their customers, we give them no income or revenue. The advertisers do. If promoting places gives them more revenue from advertisers than promoting users pages (which I imagine it does), then any company would make the same decision.
Comment by Mazher Abidi — August 23, 2010 @ 1:47 pm
Has there been any feedback from Facebook on this yet? I understand an algorithm when you have made no investment (such as Google organic listings), but when a brand has bought Facebook ads and built a fan base that way, and when their updates usually garner excellent engagement, it's very hard to understand why impressions are down by about 50-70%.
Comment by Betsy Kent — August 24, 2010 @ 6:17 am
Wrote a blog post about my thoughts on this topic… http://bit.ly/PlacesSEO
Comment by Megan Trombino — August 25, 2010 @ 10:22 am
We haven't noticed a difference, and fans are just as engaged as before (based on the number of likes and comments we get)
Comment by Brittany — August 30, 2010 @ 1:30 pm
we have almost 65k Fans and we've definitely felt the algo change . . . i would say 40-50% more than 70 . . .
Comment by Gary — August 31, 2010 @ 10:54 am
[...] Facebook launched Places a few weeks ago, many Page administrators noticed that their growth rates were cut substantially. In some cases the exposure a Page would get was down upwards of 60 percent. While Page story [...]
Pingback by Facebook Page Growth Rates Return To Pre-Places Launch — September 14, 2010 @ 2:04 pm
[...] Facebook launched Places a few weeks ago, many Page administrators noticed that their growth rates were cut substantially. In some cases the exposure a Page would get was down upwards of 60 percent. While Page story [...]
Pingback by Facebook Page Growth Rates Return To Pre-Places Launch — September 14, 2010 @ 2:04 pm
FB wants you to buy ads. access to the Feed is just bait
Comment by techmuso — September 16, 2010 @ 3:00 pm
But if FB wants people to buy ads, pages like my own [ im not right in the head.com ] that are exploding in growth bring more eyeballs that they can deliver. It makes no sense, ultimately.
Comment by Mark Cacciatore — September 18, 2010 @ 10:25 pm
AllFacebook: Pages are still experiencing lower status update impressions. Can you shed any more light on what's going on? It started on Aug. 18 and no sign of changing. And, Facebook Places seems to be off most people's radar screens right now. Would love to hear your insights. Thanks!
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