by George Takei
I am still getting used to the idea that, because my posts reach so many fans so quickly, I have a higher responsibility to ensure that they are accurate, lest I become part of the reason a false rumor spreads. Whether I should be held to a higher standard is still an open question, as I’m neither a journalist nor an expert, but I do understand that sheer numbers have begun to make the question moot. Knowing that I can have a back channel to Facebook, if needed, is an unexpected honor, and I plan to take advantage of it when confronted again with technical questions.
Indeed, Facebook recently extended an invitation to me personally to come visit their headquarters, and I hope to be able to take them up on the offer if I can find a window when I will be in the San Francisco Bay Area. I don’t want to get too cozy with the company, mind you, as I’m still just a user and have my share of issues.
In the next chapter, I discuss some of the specifics about Facebook and its algorithms. It’s a bit on the technical side, but a lot of folks who use social media regularly wanted me to spill some secrets of my success on Facebook.
I have a great deal of respect for what is still a fledgling company, for despite its detractors Facebook has managed to connect over a billion people and certainly has changed my life in myriad unexpected and positive ways.
And let’s face it, we all still need our Facefix.
I’m on the Edge
Fans (and the press) often wonder how a 75-year old actor who had his heyday in a science fiction series from the 1960s came to have some three million fans on Facebook. I honestly often wonder the same thing. Looking back, there are a few reasons that come to mind, none of which I understood when I first started sharing online. It turns out, the success of my page is mostly tied up in something Facebook calls “EdgeRank.”
I should preface this by saying I am not certain exactly how
“EdgeRank” works. It’s a secret algorithm that Facebook guards closely. But I do understand some of its basic principles, and how they worked to my page’s advantage in the early going. So nerd out with me a bit in this chapter, and I’ll let you in on some secrets on why I think my page got the “edge” when it comes to fans and fan interaction, and why I worry that Facebook actually might be pushing some of its users to the edge.
Before I jump in, let me preface this by explaining that I have been both a champion and critic of Facebook, but always with the hope of creating a better experience for everyone. Admittedly, it took me some time to come up to speed on how Facebook works, and to pinpoint where it works best, and where it sometime falls short. Lately, my status updates or even my comments on other pages about Facebook’s ranking algorithm have gotten picked up by the press, especially after Facebook’s less-than-optimal initial public offering. Everyone is wondering whether Facebook is on the right track, and as an avid user with one of the most engaged fan bases, I’ve become something of a magnet for controversy.
Some basic concepts first. Contrary to what many users believe, when you post something on Facebook, it doesn’t show up in all of your friends’ newsfeeds. Just imagine if it did; basic math dictates this would soon overload the system. So instead, Facebook assigns an “EdgeRank” to each post to determine whether it will appear in someone else’s feed. If people frequently comment, share or click “like” on your posts, it’s more likely that your future posts will appear in their newsfeeds.
This gives a distinct advantage to those who got in the game early and drew attention, because their posts will tend to edge out other posts. Consider this: If there’s limited real estate (i.e., what can physically appear in your newsfeed), and Facebook gives greater priority to the posts of those you’ve interacted with before, then the chance that you’ll see a new friend’s or page’s post is comparatively lower. Conversely, think of all those annoying people you don’t really know that well yet are constantly liking or commenting on your status updates; your posts wind up on their newsfeeds more frequently than on the streams of your good friends, who are likely largely ignoring your posts because, well, they’re your good friends already and don’t need to read your statuses.
This aspect of EdgeRank can be distressing for community, celebrity and company pages that want to promote on Facebook. They discover, for example, that their attempts to reach their fans — even those that have clicked “like” on their pages — often fall short because there simply isn’t much existing engagement with them. This means that their posts, however well-crafted, often never even reach much of their intended audience. One article I read suggested that the average post by a page only reaches about 16% of its fans due to EdgeRank and the fact that, shockingly, people are not on Facebook 24/7. This presents a bit of a conundrum, because in order to gain engagement, pages need to reach their fans, but they can’t reach their fans without first gaining more engagement.
In mid-2012, Facebook put forth a solution: Promoted Posts. Under this program, pages can pay to ensure that their posts reach more of their fans. It has been popular of late to lay into Facebook over Promoted Posts, which some say reduces the visibility of non-profit, community or small business sites in favor of larger corporations willing to spend serious money. Page administrators cry foul for a few reasons.
First, many point out that Facebook encourages pages to use advertising to grow the number of fans, but never did a great job explaining that most of those people would not wind up seeing the very pages they signed up for — unless they stayed engaged. In other words, people spent money — sometimes considerable amounts — to grow a base that now may be out of reach in most cases, unless they pay more.
© Eléonore H - Fotolia.com. Used with Permission
Second, many comparatively large pages with a wide reach really can’t afford to pay thousands of dollars per post to reach more fans. I would never really consider spending money to reach my fans because, frankly, I’m not in it for the same reasons as Coca-Cola or Starbucks. As I write this, I’m looking at my most recent post, which Facebook says I can pay $4,000 to have reach over a million people. This is ironic to me, because it already reached over a million. So what exactly would I be buying? It’s not really that clear.
Finally, Facebook indicates with Promoted Posts that fans will be told they are being promoted to because the post will appear as a “sponsored story” much the same way certain establishments appear in sites such as Yelp. But fans view any kind of sponsored or commercial post with suspicion. I know this first hand: Anytime I try to sell anything online, including the book you are now reading, fans know and take a more jaundiced view of the effort. It’s simply part of human nature, especially when very few of my other posts ask anything of the fans.
I don’t begrudge Facebook for wanting to make more money. They’re now a publicly traded company, and they have to answer to different masters than before. But Facebook should tread carefully before this becomes a huge PR problem. As pages have seen their numbers crash, many have threatened to leave Facebook in search of cheaper ways to reach fans, such as Twitter or even Google+. Or they’ll stop spending money trying to acquire fans, knowing that they have to spend money again just to reach them.
When I asked other Page owners to convey their experiences with Facebook and its EdgeRank system, I received back almost universally negative comments. Here are a handful of examples out of dozens and dozens of complaints people left in responses to my inquiry:
I AM A STAY AT HOME MOM WHO HAS WORKED TIRELESSLY IN THE LAST YEAR AND A HALF TO BUILD [MY JEWELRY BUSINESS.] I HAVE 8,300 FANS, AND NOW ONLY A FRACTION OF THEM SEE MY POSTS, EVEN WHEN I PAY. IT HAS SEVERELY AFFECTED MY BUSINESS.
I WOULD LIKEN THIS TO EXTORTION. “HEY, HERE’S TRAFFIC, BUT NOW WE’RE GOING TO TAKE IT AWAY FROM YOU AND MAKE YOU PAY FOR IT.”
AS SOMEONE WHO RUNS A FACEBOOK PAGE, I’M DISAPPOINTED THAT ANYONE WHO CHOOSES TO FOLLOW OUR PAGE HAS TO OPT-IN AFTER “LIKING” US TO HAVE OUR POSTS SHOW UP ON THEIR PAGE, ESPECIALLY SINCE THAT INFO ISN’T EXPLICITLY INCLUDED ANYWHERE.
I RUN
A PAGE DESIGNED TO PROMOTE AWARENESS FOR EPILEPSY. HIT RATE HAS DROPPED. MEANWHILE, SHELL ADS (AS IN THE GAS COMPANY) KEEP APPEARING ON MY PERSONAL TIMELINE. TO SAY I’M PISSED ABOUT IT IS AN UNDERSTATEMENT.
TRAFFIC DROPPED A TON, THEN WE CHUCKED $15 DOLLARS INTO PROMOTING AND IT WENT UP BRIEFLY - I TOOK ADVANTAGE OF THIS BY LEARNING HOW TO INCREASE TRAFFIC (OURS IS DOG RESCUE AND WE ARE DEPENDENT ON BEING SEEN) AND IT WORKED FOR AWHILE AND THEN BAM! -TRAFFIC PLUMMETED EVEN LOWER THAN BEFORE. IT IS FRUSTRATING AND EXHAUSTING TRYING TO KEEP UP WITH THE BEST WAYS TO THWART THE FACEBOOK TRICKS.
I MANAGE A NOT-FOR-PROFIT ARTS PAGE AND WE’VE SEEN DRASTIC REDUCTIONS ON OUR NUMBERS. I THINK THE ANNOYANCE IS THAT WHEN YOU ‘LIKE’ A PAGE IT’S BECAUSE YOU WANT TO SEE THE CONTENT. PERHAPS, FACEBOOK NEEDS TO DEVELOP A ‘KINDA LIKE’ BUTTON. ASKING FANS TO GO BACK AND CHANGE ALL THEIR SETTINGS IS RIDICULOUS.
My own page saw some fairly drastic and worrisome collapses in reach and engagement during July and September of 2012. It was frustrating for me because this drop came at the same time Facebook launched its Promoted Pages campaign, leading me to believe that the two were connected, and that I was under pressure to pay to keep my reach up. Facebook explained that the two had nothing to do with each other, and that changes were all intended to improve user experience.
The problem of course is that as more and more real estate in the Newsfeed is purchased by companies that can afford to advertise and buy that space, fewer people will see posts from pages that they actually have liked. In order to prevent a slide in engagement, I have taken some proactive measures.
First, I remind fans periodically that the more engaged they are, the more likely I will appear in their feeds. Second, I asked fans to add me to their “interests” so that they can view my post together with other interests at their leisure. And third, I lately have begun telling fans to “Get Notifications” of my posts, so that they receive an alert that I posted and then can go to my page for the latest. The last option appears to have made some real difference in my engagement numbers, because people are not limited to being online exactly when my post would cross their feed — they can go back and look on their own time later.
In November of 2012, just days before this book went to print, Facebook rolled out a new feature called “Pages Feed” which users could select. The idea behind Pages feed is that users who want to see more of their “liked” pages’ posts could filter their feed so that only posts from pages (and not friends) appeared in their feed. This is a welcome development which goes some way towards answering the critics. But for folks who have “liked” many pages, this will probably do little to increase the visibility of small pages. Nor is it yet clear whether people will enable this filter on a regular basis. Still, it is great to see Facebook responding to user feedback. Some press stories credit my vocal criticism of Facebook’s Newsfeed for this new feature, but I imagine it was in the works long before I even raised the issue publicly.
Because my posts already reach a relatively high percentage of my fans, who share it with their networks whenever they interact with me, I’m admittedly something of an unlikely critic of Facebook’s EdgeRank algorithm. But let me be clear: I am concerned primarily with transparency, not with the actual algorithm itself, which appears to do its job. I personally can’t think of any better way for Facebook to assign relevance to posts and determine who should see them.
This doesn’t mean, however, that the solution is something like Promoted Pages. If Facebook intends to keep the program, it needs to be completely upfront with page owners about how few of their fans actually see each post now and what they can expect after they pay for a post. For example, if EdgeRank rewards interactivity, pages might want to limit their promoted posts to those that could go highly viral but need an extra push. Page owners thus need to educate themselves about how Facebook works, especially before spending a lot of money on Promoted Posts.
My outspokenness about Facebook and willingness to voice my concerns has gotten me into some hot water. For example, I was accused flat out by prominent technology blogger Robert Scoble of whining that I want all my posts seen by all my fans. This simply isn’t true. I know that such a demand is both impractical and rather greedy given the limited space on each user’s feed. Scoble also accused me of creating so much Internet “noise” with my posting that I ought to “sit down and shut up.” Well, I didn’t become an advocate for equality and civil rights by sitting down and shutting up, so I was not about to do that. Scoble even admitted in his tirade that, though he hates my posts, his wife enjoys them and shares them with him all the time. I put out this cheeky tweet in response:
All kidding aside, Scoble does miss a basic point. His wife and other fans actively have decided that they want to see my content. They want to hear my noise — and probably don’t consider it “noise” at all. They clicked “like” on my page with the expectation that they would see my posts, or at least most of them. Many are surprised to learn that they receive only a fraction of them. If Scoble prefers not to have me take up space on his newsfeed from his wife’s shares, he should speak to her and tell her to screen him, rather than call on me to self-censor.
I do occasionally look at the “insights” for interactivity provided by Facebook. If I’ve understood them correctly, my “reach” (meaning, the number of people who have seen a given post) averages between 1 and 2 million. Because at the time I’m typing this I’ve got about three million fans, that means a reach of between 33 and 66 percent per post, versus the standard 15-16 percent.
I have also noticed that more pages than ever have started including a “call to action” with their posts that asks users to click “like” and “share.” This is online marketing 101. Traditional wisdom dictates that getting people to take any kind of action is important (after all, it increases the
EdgeRank your future posts have with them). A simple “ask” often does the trick. When I’ve put a call to action in my posts, the response rate often doubles or triples.
But I caution that asks should be used sparingly. People don’t like to be treated as mere clicks or numbers, or bluntly told what to do. My own fan base sometimes tsk-tsks me for such posts, and I admit it does feel somehow forced if it happens too frequently. The act of liking or sharing should feel like a voluntary gesture, not a favor or compelled response. And as more pages figure out the short-term advantage of asks, Facebook has started to feel overburdened with these types of demands. Click “like” if you want this sick dog to find a happy home, keep scrolling if you don’t care! Click “share” if you feel the love of Jesus!
Lately I’ve been trying not too often to add to the “ask” pollution, and I’d prefer it if I only had to include a call to action when it makes sense. But because of the way EdgeRank works, it’s nearly impossible to ignore the power of the “ask.” So to make things more palatable, I often enjoy presenting games, such as a popular song with lyrics in “Spockese” with instructions to “like” and “share” when you “get it.”
WE ONLY ARE RECENTLY ACQUAINTED, AND THIS MAY SEEM HIGHLY ILLOGICAL, BUT HERE IS A NUMERICAL SEQUENCE BY WHICH YOU MAY CONTACT ME VIA YOUR COMMUNICATION DEVICE, PERHAPS YOU WILL MAKE USE OF IT.
I also like to post puzzles to see if we can collectively solve them. This was one famous one:
I asked the fans to post how many squares they could count and to share this with their friends. It turns out there are 40 — though I could only get up to 34 on my first attempt. When some fans began to post comments that they could count 40 squares, it encouraged the rest of us to go back and try harder.
I also enjoy caption contests. In the early days, I would simply post an image, invite captions, and attempt to read through the comments. But this soon proved impossible. For one caption contest, with an infamous image of my friend Nichelle Nichols (Star Trek’s Uhura) toying sexily with me on the bridge of the Enterprise, we received something like 13,000 comments with proposed captions. I had to divide the work among myself, Brad and o
ur intern, and it took days to go through it all. The winning entry was Uhura declaring, “The captain kisses like a girl” and me as Sulu responding, “I know.”
I’ve come to learn that, on Facebook, an image appears to get more traction than mere text. This is largely because an image takes up more space and is more attractive to the eye than text or a link. When scrolling through wall posts by fans, my own eye is drawn to images. I simply don’t have enough time or patience to read all of the text-based posts others leave.
My own experiences led me to a strong preference for images over text. After months of posting plain status updates and links to articles, I happened to share a funny image that had a caption built into it. I don’t remember what the image was exactly, but I do recall being surprised that it received many more likes and shares than my other posts did.
It dawned on me that this probably was the way to go if I wanted to engage more successfully with fans. From that point forward, I focused nearly exclusively on sharing funny, inspiring, or just plain random images. As a consequence, my Facebook page was one of the first to adopt a practice of “meme” sharing. As a rule these images also contained text; this way, whenever fans shared the photo with their friends, the humor associated with the original image would survive no matter what else the sharer added. Because, by accident and not by design, I always uploaded the meme myself rather than shared it from another page, this wound up inadvertently creating in each meme a viral advertisement for my page.