If you operate a Facebook Page, you may have noticed a couple of subtle changes Facebook has made to the look of the pages for admins. These changes are a clear attempt to coax page owners into promoting their content, or at least help remind them that it’s an option.
First up, you may have seen the new post analytics box at the top of your admin panel. It shows all of your promotable posts (links, photos, etc.), their total reach, and their paid reach. There’s also a button to quickly promote each individual post:
The other is simply a terminology shift. Instead of offering admins the ability to “promote” post, Facebook is now saying they can “boost” posts. I guess “boost” sounds better that “promote.” Clicking on “boost post” brings up the same Promoted Post menu that you’re used to.
Earlier this year, Facebook came under fire over their Promoted Posts feature. Some page owners accused Facebook of pulling the old “bait-and-switch” by burying pages’ content in order to force them to pay for promotion. Facebook vehemently denied this.
Back in December, Facebook announced that about 300,000 pages had paid to promote at least one post. Doing the math, that meant that just of 2% of local businesses pages had utilized the feature. Facebook also said that 2.5 million individual posts had been promoted, meaning that the average page owner who utilizes Promoted Posts promotes a little over 8 posts. These figures are now a few months old, but it gives us a little insight into how much attention page owners were giving the Promoted Post option about 7 months in. Now, we’re coming up on one year of Facebook opening up Promoted Posts to page owners.