Facebook Algorithm Changes Drastically Diminish Artist Page Engagement
Back in January of this year, Facebook algorithm changes completely revamped the way we interacted with our news feed. The desired effect? Place the emphasis back on interaction with family and friends instead of being pushed and redirected to pages. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg had this to say about the changes:
While this update cautioned marketers and brands that they will “see less engagement,” nobody knew exactly just how much less. Until now.
In an analysis of over 43 million Facebook Page posts and 20,000 brands, Buffer, a social media management company, found some startling results. The findings show that overall, Page engagement has dropped by 50%. This includes over a 70% decline for Artist Pages. Subsequently, Artists are the group most affected by the algorithm changes.
While many pages attempt to counter this by posting more times each day, too many posts can also have a negative effect on traffic. Ironically, Artist Fan Group Pages have seen a spike in overall engagement. Algorithms originally pushing people to the Artist Page now push them to the Fan Page. So where Rezz‘s Artist page is suffering, “The Cult Of Rezz” Fan Group Page is thriving.
As a result, artists have been posting more frequently on Instagram and Twitter. The catch-22 is that Instagram is owned by Facebook. Instagram also continues to experiment with new algorithms, so right now, neither is really getting much traffic support. Thus far, Twitter has not experienced any adverse marketing effects, although new users are on the decline.
While the long-term effects of Facebook’s algorithm changes are yet to be seen, this is not an encouraging start. The authors of the study offered companies the following support:Â “The best way to reach our audiences on Facebook is to study the data, experiment constantly, be open to learning, and take a growth mindset.”
