Social media may be a great resource for sharing fake news stories or posting photos of your breakfast if that is your bag, but for the serious entrepreneur it has a much more important role to play. And in spite of the increasing number of other players in the field (some of which it owns in any case), Facebook remains the most valuable resource for conveying information, both to your own circle of friends and, with imagination, to a much wider audience.

Like most internet platforms Facebook offers a paid ad service, but it is entirely possible to promote a business through the intelligent use of its everyday news feed. In order that this might work for you, it is essential to understand how the feed and its various algorithms operate.

The Mission and the Method

Essentially Facebook’s mission is to connect people with the information and the stories which matter the most to them as individuals. It is to this end that its algorithms are configured. As well as being a means of providing the ultimate service to its users this approach also makes good business sense in that it keeps them looking in for longer. Every one’s a winner. What this means in practice of course is that the various items of content that will potentially be available to you are in competition with one another, with Facebook being the ultimate arbiter of what you end up seeing.

Plan Your Posts with Precision

With this in mind, every post made on Facebook with a view to drawing attention to your business needs to be with the platform’s algorithms in your thoughts. Such considerations as what is the best time to post, and what type of headings and visual material are most likely to attract “likes” (thereby resulting in it being deemed more interesting to potential readers), are of paramount importance. For the purposes of targeting a prospective audience, a post on Facebook needs to be constructed with as much care and consideration as a paid advertisement in a newspaper or on a niche website.