Facebook Is Now “Pay To Play” Only For Brands

FROM: http://www.simplyzesty.com/facebook/facebook-is-now-pay-to-play-only-for-brands/

Niall Harbison Facebook January 3, 2012

There used to be loads of ways in which you could use Facebook to create innovative campaigns but as it has evolved from a social network in to a fully fledged platform the organic opportunities have waned and it is now mostly a pay to play game. Ads come in all shapes and sizes and without them you are going to struggle to get much traction on your own Facebook page. There are still things like customer service, engaging apps, competitions and rich media content that can help you grow engagement but even those areas are having the squeeze put on them by the volume of ads on the site.

Huge Variety Of Ad Solutions

In the last 6 months as Facebook has started turning serious profits and as they are approaching an IPO they have started to switch on lots of ad solutions. There are ads in the sidebar, sponsored stories, homepage takeovers and even ads in the new ticker.

 

Feed Engagement Decreasing

It took people a long time to figure out that not everybody who liked their Facebook page was going to see their updates and content. The figure is anywhere between 5% and 20% depending on who engaged people are with the page and people have seen that decreasing further in recent months. Add in the fact that the platform is more or less saturated with brands and businesses now and getting cut through is harder than ever.

Timeline Making Things Worse

While the timeline has been mostly welcomed in recent weeks by users switching over it poses yet more problems for brands and business and getting visibility. It is widely expected that Facebook will unify the design and roll out something similar to Pages soon but for the moment it cuts down on the time people are spending on business pages. Facebook will have tested this to the death of course and if anything there will be more room than ever for ads in the future.

Pay Or Forget It

Basically if you want exposure on Facebook now you need to pay. Simple as that. Facebook have done a wonderful job of locking every area of the platform down so as they control most of the ad revenue that flows through it. Even the feed is getting harder to access and with ads coming there this month things will get even harder. A small minority of people will be able to get likes through innovative campaigns but those will need technical knowledge and will probably cost as much as advertising. The bottom line is that the quickest way to get seen these days on Facebook is through advertising.