How Can You Grow Your Facebook Reach Without Paying For Ads?

Facebook say that everyday, hundreds of thousands of business Facebook accounts can achieve their marketing goals without paying for adverts, but how true is this?

Facebook has been around since 2004 and it goes without saying that it has grown to ridiculous heights during this time… in short, Facebook has billions of users. Gone are the days of just connecting with your friends on Facebook, it is now an integral component of companies’ marketing campaigns and a way that we engage with brands, businesses, groups and influencers. Whether you are a small business like myself, or a huge corporation like Sony, almost all businesses use Facebook to expand their business and brand awareness.

But in 2007 Facebook ads were born. These ads were a way for businesses to use digital marketing to reach out to their target audience, and since then, the decline in organic reach has noticeably, and vastly decreased.

If no one knows about your Facebook account, how is it going to grow? How do you get word out there? So are you doomed if you don’t want to pay for Facebook advertising? Is there any way to grow your business’s reach on Facebook organically?

I've tried to answer these questions and break it down here.....!

What is ‘Organic Reach?’

In simple terms, how can you increase the people your posts reach, for free!

So why is Organic Reach decreasing?

Well, to start with there’s a LOT more content than there was in 2004. And I mean a LOT! Think how many times you post on Facebook a week, and then think about how many people use Facebook, and therefore how many posts there must be a week, a day, a minute, a second!! Competition for space on your feed is FIERCE! Facebook Ads has the ability to reach your exact audience, and fast, with immediate results.

So how do I get more reach without getting out my credit card?!

Produce content that people want to see!

Ok, easier said than done, right? We all think we’re producing content that everyone wants to see! Facebook says that posts that provide ‘meaningful interactions’ have much more chance of appearing in people’s feeds So what does that even mean?

If a post is commented on, shared, ‘liked’, or if you message that business off the back of a post, THIS is a post that has provided meaningful interactions! But these interactions have to be real….The Facebook algorithm is likely to demote your post if it is deemed that the content posted has simply goaded the user into commenting. For instance ‘Comment YES to see more posts like this....’

Sounds confusing doesn’t it? Well, yes it does – but just keep coming back to that phrase ‘meaningful interactions’, and it suddenly makes much more sense.

Here are 5 tips for boosting organic reach of Facebook:

1) Are you in your followers’ feeds? Ask your followers to turn on notifications for your posts! Sounds simple doesn’t it, but not always obvious.

2) Ensure your content is awesome (quality, not quantity)

3) Personalise your brand – be real, be true, be genuine. Be human, write from the heart.

4) Create video content – video is king! This is a big topic at the moment. Facebook and Instagram love video.

5) Interact – reply to comments, engage and promote conversations. But remember it needs to be meaningful.

But remember, if you do want to look into Facebook advertising, the benefits can be vast. Facebook advertising is the most targeted form of advertising, and it's also amongst the cheapest. It drives immediate results and you don't need training (although it can help.)

But, perhaps, I will save this for a new blog....!

Photo by Timothy Hales Bennett on Unsplash