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Facebook has been under fire by both brand and fan in recent months, most notably due to their inability to keep both happy, harmoniously. As a result, Facebook has rolled out a new feature that allows users to view a separate News Feed compiled with only the updates from brand’s Pages they have liked. Point your eyes to the menu bar on the left hand side of your Facebook News Feed and see ‘Pages Feed’, to check it out.

This undoubtedly, is a response to the growing brand dissatisfaction with decreased post reach as well as to the increase of fans reporting brands’ posts as ‘spam’ . As it currently stands, brand pages are only able to reach a rough 10 -15% of their fan base with status update posts on any given day. This percentage is obviously influenced by how successful a brand’s voice is at engaging their fans [likes, comments, shares] etc. If a brand is offering up diverse, engaging and interesting content frequently they are much more likely to have a fan base that remains tuned-in to posts and promotions alike. But 10% is still 10% so Facebook has offered the ‘pay to play’ option as Mark Cuban puts it, which asks brands to promote their posts if they want to increase their reach.

With brand pages that account for hundreds of thousands, if not millions of fans this option ends up costing from $500 to $2000 and up, per post. The contention around this has been made more public this week when Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban, voiced his issues on Twitter and threatened – excuse me, promised – to move the Mavericks online hub away from Facebook entirely.

As a regular Facebook user, a fan of brand pages and the Social Media Manager of a national brand page myself – I’m caught in the center of the argument. As a regular user I would prefer not to have my eye balls bombarded by brand promotions when I’m just interested in what’s going on with my friends. But as a brand, I want my status updates, creative custom photos and brand messaging to reach everyone I got to click ‘like’ in the first place!

Will the ‘Pages Only’ News Feed be the solution? From the brand fan’s perspective, I appreciate the opportunity to catch up on industry news, trends and promotions in one spot because I value the digest but how are these posts filtered, and what about those who never check it? As a page Manager, does this new Feed option create a greater opportunity to reach more of my fan base or cost me less to promote my brand?

Facebook rolled out this option Wednesday morning so your page should be updated – check it out and let me know your thoughts in the comments below or via Twitter: @RTAJennifer

Are you into the ‘Pages Only’ News Feed?

Written By: Jennifer Boshan
Category: Advertising, brands, Content, Design, Digital, Facebook, Industry News, marketing, Online, Web
Tags: brand, comment, facebook, fan, like, Mark Cuban, News Feed, Pages Only, share, Twitter

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