PLATFORM CHANGES VALUE OF INTERACTIVE CONTENT

CONTACT LENSES provide a great topic for your social media channels. In fact, it is the topic of my practice’s most engaged social media post to date!

Specifically, we created a Facebook Live Video regarding our contact lens recycling program. We chose video as our platform to get the word out, and then chose parameters to maximize the number of people who would see it, by taking the steps outlined here.

ALGORITHMS CHANGE

Recognize that each social media platform can often change the way content is published and how many people will organically see it.

Facebook does a great job of keeping its users aware of these changes. (See “News Feed FYI: Balancing Content from Friends and Pages” and “News Feed FYI: Taking into Account Live Video When Ranking Feed” blog posts by Facebook.) An excellent website that will help you keep on top of these changes is Wallaroo Media (bit.ly/2oF4spq ).

Two recent changes to Facebook have made a dramatic impact on a business owner’s ability to reach audiences.

The first happened in April 2015, and it was a big one. “Simply put, users now see more posts from close friends in their News Feed than posts made from the Pages they follow,” according to the Wallaroo Media post mentioned above. (Facebook Ads are not affected by the change!)

What this means to you, as a business owner, is that organic reach, which has been declining for years, will be even lower. So, if you want more of your audience to see your posts, you will most likely have to start using Facebook Ads, including boost. (See March’s “Social Media” for more on boosting.) This need was emphasized again in an algorithm update in June.

The second relevant change occurred in March 2016, when Facebook announced it would be giving priority to Facebook Live Videos in a user’s newsfeed. This is something that Facebook pages can — and should — take advantage of! By taking advantage of Facebook Live Videos, you will have the best chance of organically reaching more of your fan base.

POST A LIVE VIDEO

This is exactly what we did at Park Slope Eye. Specifically, the aforementioned post was seen by 23,226 people, with more than 10,000 views, 117 likes, 11 shares and 18 comments, as this publication goes to press.

Here are the five steps you may utilize to post a Facebook Live Video:

1. Make sure you have the Facebook Pages app on your smartphone. (It’s available for both Android and iOs.)
2. Use the “Live” button to set up and broadcast. Remember this is a live broadcast. If you make a mistake, you must keep going! It might not hurt to do a dry run, so you are best prepared.
3. The Facebook Live broadcast, upon completion, will become a Facebook post. “Pin” this post to the top of your Page for added visibility. (To do so after it is posted, suggest the drop-down carrot from the top right hand corner of the post. From the menu, select “Pin to Top of Page.” This feature keeps the post at the top of your Page’s feed, until you “Unpin” it.)
4. “Boost” this post to a custom audience. Specifically, we targeted our fans and friends of our fans, who live locally. This helped get our post in front of the people who, we felt, it mattered to most and who would be more inclined to do business with us.
5. Use a program to schedule regular reposts of this popular and important post. (See April’s column for more on this.)
   In this example, the post is set to publish every two weeks. Expect the reach and engagement to drop off with each subsequent post. However, popular, important posts can do well each time they are posted.

GET STARTED

Check out the post for yourself at bit.ly/2oEuPM8 , and start your own live broadcasts! OM

DR. BAZAN is founder of Park Slope Eye, in Brooklyn, N.Y. He is a member of the AOA, NYSOA and the American Academy of Orthokeratology & Myopia Control. In 2014, he received financial compensation for services from Allergan, Bausch + Lomb, Vision Service Plan, Luxottica, The Vision Council and Foster Grant.