It seems like once a month Facebook is introducing new add-ons or programs in order to give users more information with easier interaction. The newest ‘product’ they have introduced is called Facebook Reach; a useful tool for those who are professionally networking on Facebook or wish to start promoting their business on the social platform.
Facebook Reach Benefits Small Biz
The ‘Reach’ is the number of unique visitors (those who found your page on their own) who visit your page and see your posts. It also tracks other information such as comments, likes, negative feedback, and clicks. Facebook Reach breaks these reach numbers down even further into categories. These include organic, viral, paid, post, and page reaches.
Post vs Page Reach
Post reach refers to the number of user who saw one certain post appear in their newsfeed. Page reach refers to the number of users who saw ANY of your page content in a specific range of time: daily, weekly, monthly, etc. By nature these two can be confusing; by posting frequently you may achieve a higher page reach, whereas posting less often can result in a higher post reach.
Organic
Organic reach is what you get from Facebook for free. It’s when your fans see your posts in their newsfeed and those who visit your page on their own.
Viral
Viral Reach is described as when someone likes one of your posts, comments on it, or shares it on their Facebook Page. These stories will appear in the newsfeed of not just the ‘liker,’ but additionally in the newsfeed of the liker’s person’s friends as well, who may not be fans of the page. This type of reach is very beneficial because new fans and followers are many times the result of the viral content. Plus, with Viral Reach you can see who is viewing and sharing your posts directly.
Paid
We all have to turn a profit sometime, and Facebook is no different now that its stock is publicly traded. Those pages with a large fan base have most likely paid to promote certain posts in order to reach more users. Small businesses and those with small fan bases are encouraged to use the “Paid” feature for content posts at least occasionally to drive Facebook reach even further. By default, this reach will be larger since it’s been paid for. Paid statistics are the easiest to track and report.
Summary
Now that we have all this information, what do we do with it? Before ‘Reach,’ administrators would compare the number of people reached just by looking at their total number of fans or “likers.” With the algorithms of Facebook Reach today, business page users have the ability to target their market audience, increases shares and likes, see who is responding and track other demographics while promoting their business for free or just on a small budget.