Recent Facebook news feed changes may have resulted in much lower exposure for those who are promoting businesses, websites, and Web content without paying for exposure. According to a March 5 article by Nick Bilton in the New York Times, not only has he experienced a substantial drop in exposure over the past several weeks, but he has received countless emails from others who also have a documented loss. According to this columnist, the whole issue revolves around Facebook monetizing sharing through sponsored posts; it previously only monetized ads in the sidebar.
In an initial article in the New York Times last week, Bilton laid out his experience with posts that he made through regular channels and posts that he made through the paid exposure options on Facebook. As confusing as Facebook and its algorithms are, the overall point he was making is that engagement is getting harder unless you pay Facebook for that engagement.
The disturbing part was that often people and businesses have purchased advertising to increase the “Likes” on their professional pages, but without continued monetary promotion, the pages suffer with little exposure in the news feed.
In his latest article, Nick Bilton goes further to explain that this is a widespread trend, not an isolated incidence. Facebook has denied his claims, and he shared the statement Facebook made to the New York Times:
“We want to be really clear that the News Feed algorithm does not artificially suppress free distribution in order to get people to purchase promoted posts or ads,” the statement said.
We have been told that social media is now necessary for engaging readers or customers. Could it be that all the “shares” being carefully conducted by those seeking to promote their endeavors on Facebook are now a waste of time?
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