{Edited to add: OH MY!!! When I wrote this little post yesterday I NEVER expected this sort of response. I’ve been away from my computer for the entire day on a road trip to take my daughter to her grandparents for the week, so I apologize for my absence in the discussion. For the record, I do want to add that I am more than good with paying for the utility of my Facebook business page (yearly fee, monthly fee, etc.); however, I would certainly appreciate some clear and forthright communication on what exactly our fees encompass. Following is a screen shot of the FB FAQ page regarding the protected posts that apparently a huge number of people still cannot access. I need to clarify that even a promoted post does not guarantee that it will show up in ALL of your fans feeds, but rather here are the details straight from Facebook: “When you promote a post, it will be shown in the news feeds of more of the people who like your Page than you would reach normally. Friends of the people who have interacted with your post will also be more likely to see the story in their news feeds for up to 3 days from when the post was first created.”
I am still disappointed about how our interactions impact our reach now too. I don’t regularly “interact” with my favorite online fabric shops’ FB pages, but I sure do want all of their posts to show up in my feed because I value having their information. I just don’t have either the time or the inclination to comment on everyone’s updates. It’s a conundrum for sure.
Oh Facebook…what am I going to do with you?}
I don’t get riled up about too much. Well, maybe inwardly, but almost never enough to even say it out loud. But today Facebook crossed the line.
If you happen to have a business or fan page of any type over on Facebook you may or may not have noticed over the past few months that it seemed like not all of your fans were seeing your posts in their feeds. If it felt that way to you, you weren’t losing your marbles, you were right! And today it all makes sense.
When I just skipped over to my Lovespun Studio Facebook page to share a blog update, I had a little notice waiting for me about new “Promoted” posts. Here’s the gist: Right now only certain fans see your updates in their feeds. However, if you now PAY Facebook $5 for an estimated reach of 900 fans or $10 to reach approximately 1600 fans, then your status update will show up in the feed of everyone who “likes” your page.
Here’s my problem. When I like a page, I assume that I will see all of their updates so that I know what is going on with sales, new products or even just be able to interact with that business. I also assume that anyone who likes my business page wants to keep current on all information too. So needless to say, I’ve been frustrated for a while realizing that my updates never ever reach even close to the full number of people who like my page, but today when they touted the ability to reach them IF I pay for it– well, that just made me crazy mad!
I think that advertising is invaluable. It’s worth the price. BUT, not on Facebook. If I want to advertise on Facebook, I would set up an ad to run in the right hand ad-bar. I don’t want to advertise to my fans. I want to interact with them. I want to be friends with them. I want to get to know them and hear what they want to see from Lovespun Studio. I do not want to feel like there is no way to keep in touch with them aside from PAYING to do it. It feels cheap. And I feel manipulated and completely duped!
What are your thoughts? If you have a Facebook business or blog page, have you noticed this yet? It appears that they are rolling this out slowly and incrementally. This link tells you more, but lots of my friends couldn’t open it.
Such a disappointing day for Facebook.
{If you’d like to read more, also in this series:}
Calling Out Facebook Part 2: My Favorite Comments {and a juicy little secret}
About Kirsten
OMG are you freaking kidding me?? I was so confused by no interaction and now this. Seriously insane. I mean I only have like 1600 on one page and just started a new one but I worked hard for every one there and now can’t get a break.
Shana~I was clued in a couple months ago when I started noticing VERY limited interaction going on with my page too. Isn’t it a shame? I understand FB’s position; however, nothing about this entire process has been forthright. What a huge disappointment for small business owners who have put hours of effort into building a community on their FB pages. So so sad.
You said it all right there, Kirsten. I don’t mind paying fee’s, we as business owners have an understanding that is part of the process of business ownership. Advertising isn’t free per say. But – to be informed, I feel if Facebook wants for it’s business page owners to pay for something, we should be well informed of it, not tiptoe around it. This is sad & now I understand why my page has lost a bit of traffic from what it had before. Sad…..
What about all the non-profits and volunteers and farmers that set up fan pages? They don’t get paid for what they do. I am a blogger for a store, and I don’t get paid (yet lol). I also can only reach a local market within 60 mi radius of my home. I set up a FB fan page to reach people that needed info, not to buy a product that I’d be making money on. Nope, no money. I think FB groups is a great way to still get what you want from FB without having to pay. I am about to just go ahead and Twitter, as it would probably reach more of my fans….or get more fans.
This is super uncool. I’ll have to check out my bosses page and see what’s going on there. I haven’t noticed anything different, but I’m an admin on the page too so that might be way. Fb has gone of out of their way to invite businesses and marketing has been a huge part of their growth, and then this?! I stick my tongue out at them.
PS – completely different note. I have a friend coming home for the summer. I know you’re super busy, but she may need some love. Just FYI for now
Love YOU!
I noticed the same thing lately… my posts used to reach a lot more of my fans.. its pretty much down to a 1/4 of maybe even lower to the amount of people my posts used to reach. I feel your frustration!
Well, I am glad to know I havent been crazy this whole time. I used to be able to post an outfit and i would get a crazy amount of comments in no time.. Now, I post things sometimes and I dont even get a “like”, not to toot my own horn, but I almost always used to get a couple of likes, even if it was from my momma!!!
I think this is TERRIBLE… but i have said for a long time that small businesses were making too much money off of using facebook and that it would slowly come to a halt..
I also think that it is only a matter of time before something “better” than facebook comes out.. The fact that facebook is now public is going to start turning peoples heads to using it and the more weird things they change and add like the timeline and the weird large pictures.. Myspace was so popular prior to facebook, then it totally tanked when facebook became so popular.. i’m sure there is some genius out there working on the next BIG thing.
however, as sad as I am to admit this, I would probably pay the money to ensure that my posts were being seen.. Im not sure my business can continue to thrive without it..
I have been noticing the dwindling interactions and debating hoping off the fb bandwagon b/c of it. There’s no since spending HOURS promoting our biz only to be seen by NOONE!!!
But, just wanted to let you know. The next BIG thing is google plus! I’m on it now. Check it out
The ironic thing, is that the ppl complaining about no interaction with their fans, are now complaining about this “rumor” and how ppl need to stop talking about it, as it’s not true. So….logically speaking, it HAS to be true, because the lack of response from your fans is obvious. There was a bunch of this “like this if you see my status”. I just went onto my fav pages last night, by searching, and found one, that I KNOW never went through my feed. The last 6 mos of all those pages (I didn’t check all 760), have NOT made it through my feed. I am ALWAYS reading my FB, now there is little point.
Devils advOcate. Facebook is a for profit cOmpany that provides a free service to businesses. Think Of how much business you get from the word of mouth, not frOm your posts but your clients commenting tagging etc. So we could pay for promoted posts OR we could pay for even having a page. Now that it is public shareholders are going to want to see a return, exPect more revenue generating plays above all else.
I’m a business owner. Would you advise me to lure people into something my business is doing with the unmistakeable implication it’s free, only to get them in so deep they must pay me when I surprise them with fees?
It’s called the “freemium” model and it’s business as usual.
Google, for instance, just started charging for use of google maps to large websites. It has been free for a long time. Now they must find an alternative or pay the fees.
If you don’t want to pay, find another solution.
See that’s the problem, there isn’t anything quiet like Facebook. MySpace went the way of the dodo, for example. Facebook is supposed to be able socializing. They already have ways of generating revenue.
This is not only shady but harmful. Who ever came up with the idea needs to get their head out from their rear. There is a ton of other ways they could generate reveue from other business’ fan pages rather then limiting the amount of information from those pages that gets shared!
They could go so far as to strip the affiliate links and put up their own if they wanted to do it that way (there is a cash cow there that uses fan pages to promote affiliate links). Or charge a fee for affiliate link privileges. They could create an algorithm that tracks obvious affiliate links, flag them, and reduce those exposures rather then “random” posts. The other options are endless.
See, reducing the exposure on a site that is as unique as FB is a form of entrapment. Google maps has other “map” competitors.. what does FB have really?
The whole point about the web, the one that governments are trying to stifle – is that it is a free for all information highway. The same holds for Facebook. It owes its existence and success to creating a free, open to all, social network. They make money off advertising (which I use a lot for my business, and it is NOT cheap) – but the audience is there because the interaction is free. Once they start charging for that, the businesses will go away aw we are small and cannot afford it. Large businesses such as GM have already reduced their advertising fees significantly for FB – now, their core business, the small business owners, will go away, then they are dead. Their stock is NOT a huge success already anyway and it seems to me the bubble is about to burst – time to look for the next place.
When I heard this I decided not to spend another penny on advertising at Facebook. I have advertised in the past to reach more potential “fans” and the idea that Facebook can continue to squeeze more dollars out of me by selectively withholding that audience is appalling. They continue to change the rules about what access we can have to our own audience–just more proof that we should be using Facebook to build our mailing lists and blog subscribers and pull that audience to a place that’s really our own. I haven’t seen the “promoted posts” message yet, but when I do, I will be ignoring it loudly!
I have yet to see it myself, and I can’t seem to find it in the TOS or Fan Page information that have. The link sent me to a “dead” link.
However, I’m below the 1k marker as yet. I wonder if it’s based on over all totals of “likes”?
I’ve also noticed in the past few weeks that if I go to a business fan page my friend has liked I can’t get any info until I like them. But I want to see what they’re about first so I don’t hit the like button. Seems ridiculous you can’t look at a business page without liking it…
I was so confused and thought my fans did not like my post. I have had very limited interaction, this is terrible. I think we need to start our own small business “Facebook” site.
This explains everything! No wonder I’ve been getting little to no feedback from my fans! This totally sux and I refuse to pay to promote my own posts!
I sent a message to facebook complaining about this. I have over 1400 fans and only 200 see my posts. I started asking them to like any of my pictures or posts at least once a week. This has raised delivery to 600 people but they aren’t all my fans. They are friends of friends who don’t seem to be clicking and liking my page anyway. This was such an awesome way of reaching new people and marketing but facebook has gone way overboard with their control issues.
I sent a message to facebook complaining about this. I have over 1400 fans and only 200 see my posts. I was not happy. What I started doing was asking my fans to like any of my pictures or posts at least once a week. This has raised delivery to 600 people but they aren’t all my fans. They are friends of friends who don’t seem to be clicking and liking my page anyway. This was such an awesome way of reaching new people and marketing but facebook has gone way overboard with their control issues.
Oh this just makes me mad! Yes, I totally agree with you… People follow businesses in order to see in thier newsfeed what that business is doing…. no one is going to take the time to go directly to that busness’s page…. cause then whats the difference to a noraml website?!
I completely understand your frustration and you are not alone! However, how long did we expect our marketing on FB to remain completely free? I know you don’t want to advertise on FB in the traditional sense we see advertising, but interaction is a form of marketing/advertising as well. That’s why we want to be able to do it. FB marketing is somethig tons of people have made a nice living on, teaching others how to grow their business through FB marketing and interaction. It was only a matter of time before FB decided it was time to get theirs from the success others were reaping from their tool. And if you think about it, that’s just business. Now that they are a publicly traded company, they have the responsibility of turning increasing profits. We will probably see more of the same in the future. That’s just my 2 cents worth!
I don’t have a problem with Facebook making money…they’re a business and that’s the point. I do have a problem with paying Facebook for one thing and having them decide later to give me something else. This arrangement feels like making the choice between renting and buying a product; when you choose to buy, you don’t expect to have to continue renting. I feel like they sold me a product (access to part of their population) and now they ALSO want to rent it to me. I wish I’d known I was buying for the privilege to rent BEFORE I paid for advertising, that’s all!
THAT’S INSANE. I thought I was ping crazy! They NEED to brig this up to Facebook. I agree completely!
Facebook has lots of policies that drive me crazy. I am actually not surprised by this new feature. They are a public company now and have to generate revenue. I am not sure yet if I will promote my posts or not. I am not sure I am getting a ton of business from my FB fan page.
You can use an analytic software or plugin for your website to track traffic if your host doesn’t have something like that for you. I know my Etsy shop shows me where traffic is being generated, and where they are going!
Wow, I’m so glad someone stepped up and said something about this …I’m a photographer and I was honestly sitting here going “Has my work quality honestly declined over the last couple months?” because it wasn’t getting nearly the attention it used to. It didn’t make any sense to me. I kind of get it that it’s not “normal” for so many people to get free advertising the way we have in the past, but I definitely think we should have been warned when it happened, not a couple months into it when everybody is confused and feeling down about their product quality. I feel like it was on purpose to give us a taste of how much we’re going to NEED to use the promote option in order to stay afloat on Facebook.
Also, It would be nice to have the option of paying a one-time fee for our page listing instead of paying EVERY TIME we post something. Some of us are more active than others, and I know I myself can’t afford to pay for every post.
My thought is that they probably should have thought about this when they created pages in the first place …I know it’s a little late now, but it’s sad that there are so many people who have invested SO much time into their pages by now.
I could see the post about the post…in other words the links.
well that sucks! although I’m glad it wasn’t just me sucking and that was the reason for less reach.
I could not agree more!!! I am… well, “pissed off” would be putting it mildly. I’ve worked hard to earn my fans!! I shouldn’t have to pay to interact with each and every one of them!!!! Knowing that they PURPOSELY limit my interactions with my earned fans just to go in this direction is sad and mind-numbing. I feel like they’re herding small business owners into a corner in an attempt to make money.
If you pay, will your post show up in news feeds of people who like your page, but have hidden you from their news feeds?
I am not surprised by the change – FB has been a free ride for many many businesses for quite a while. The right-column ads are useless as we are all conditioned to ignore them. I suspect FB will remain free for personal use, but for businesses, expect to start forking over some $$$.
And shocked that they changed things with out being up front about it? Hello??!!! it’s FACEBOOK!!! When have they been up front about anything and overly informative about how/why/when your information is used?
Absolutely absurd!
Wasn’t one of facebook’s main goals in the beginning to make it easier for businesses to connect to it’s fans/followers? Way to punish those who have utilized and ADVERTISED facebook fan pages. Geesh! I don’t know how they’ll get away with this for very long. I don’t see too many people (at least, not the small businesses) willing to pay to use a FREE service.
This almost makes me wish MySpace was still popular.
Pretty sure this is just a rumor and not true. Go to this link and it says Facebook will never charge.
https://www.facebook.com/help/myths
They aren’t charging to use it — just to promote posts. You can still use it for free!
Good point Camille! They aren’t forcing anyone to pay for their business page. I’m not sure why anyone thinks Facebook owes us the world for free for ever? If we are really seeing the success from marketing through FB, why is it such a huge deal to sponsor a couple of postings a month @ $5-10 each to market our business where we know it’s effective? Just think how offended we get when a client of ours asks us to supply our knowledge, skills, and products free of charge. We pay for web sites, domain names, etc to get our message out to our target market. FB has proven to be an excellent marketing vehicle. Looks like there is still great ROI in it, even if it isn’t still free to do everything we want it to do.
Yes! Thank you!
Totally agree with Phil
I’m amazed it’s been free for so long! And you can still have a page for free that people can visit, but it’s just going to cost a few dollars to guarantee it shows up in newsfeeds. Cheap advertising!
I have liked so many pages, that surely everything can’t show up in my newsfeed, I would never keep up! So I guess I will be seeing more from the businesses who choose to pay. In turn, I may then purchase from them, which is how advertising works! We would never expect an advert in a newspaper for free?
I am a page owner also and I am not offended by it, but perhaps a message or email explaining our options would have been nice
Lisa
Wow FB… FAIL… total FAIL.
I had noticed that in the last few months I hadn’t been seening the customer interaction that I had previously, but had no idea this is where they were going with it.
Wow! How wonderful to see so many people chiming in here! I’m on the road today or I would be chiming in with more on the discussion. Keep spreading the word. I’m happy to pay for a valuable service, but I do not appreciate sneaky and manipulative efforts to coerce me to do so! I think most of us all agree on that point.
http://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-debuts-promoted-posts–facebook-advertising-tips-2012-5
“Nothing has changed about how your posts are shared with the people who like your Page. ~ Facebook”
But isn’t this basically how FB was already “supposed” to be working… without the charges???
Yeah, nothing has changed since they’ve already cut us off from so many of our fans. Now they’re just charging for what we thought we should have been getting all along.
I can’t find anything on Facebook about this. But did they actually say that they only show certain fans your posts? Or are you just assuming that? This could be just a way of actually promoting a certain post now and then. They guarantee (somehow) that 900 or 1600 people (people or fans?) will see the post. I didn’t get the notice on my fan page yet so I’m not sure. It would be a bummer to work this hard growing my fan page only to have to literally pay to use it.
This was the first place I saw this mentioned: http://www.convinceandconvert.com/facebook/14-ways-new-facebook-betrays-small-business/ If you check out 10. Reach Generator they provide more details.
this is not completely accurate information.
True, you can purchase “promoted Posts” {both on Facebook AND Twitter fwiw!}
but they are not directly related to drops in page/post views and interaction.
LAST YEAR Facebook started
“Improve Relevancy
Finally, we are very excited to announce some new features to make your Page even more engaging for users. People can filter these by Top Posts, which shows the most interesting stories first, or by Most Recent, which show posts in chronological order. ”
The emphasis here is on their phrase “shows the most interesting stories first”
Which roughly translates to: ‘the more people click the cute thumbs up like button and/or comment on your post, the more we will push your post to the top of people’s news feeds…. so if nobody “likes” it or comments, meh, we won’t bother to post it in anyone’s feed.’
Still an annoying practice on Facebook’s end, but great content will drive your page/post views up FOR FREE!!
{I hate to see misinformation spread like wild fire and then cause so many other knee jerk reactions ripple out from there…..}
Here is a link to Facebook’s actual page with the correct info: http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10150090729064822
Thank you!
It is not entirely mislead information by any stretch – I’m not trying to argue with you by any means either – but I do feel the need to point out, although part of what you’ve said is correct, some of it isn’t. With the “Top Stories” & the “Most Recent” – I have seen numerous times “Top Stories” with no likes, no comments & it’s in the “Top Stories” section of my news feed & seen posts that have had numerous likes & comments not in the “Top Stories” – so I do not believe what Kirsten has posted in incorrect. I do feel, as a business owner & a decent following on my business page, the last few months, the interaction on my page has gone down & I haven’t, until today, understood why. I am thankful to Kirsten for having the courage to be a voice & inform us all what’s going on & I feel she’s accurate in her post. There are several people who have noticed the same issue with their pages that were once very active & have all of the sudden are not for this to be incorrect information.
It isn’t accurate when she says that we have to pay to reach our current fans. Yes, with the latest changes with pages, interactions have dropped a lot. What this means for us as page owners is we need to do more to engage our clients and potential clients. It makes it harder on us yes, but work is hard
Diana is right. Remember awhile back people where told that unless they interacted with pages, they would stop seeing them so much? I remember my friend’s asking me to like their post every 3 months or so we would keep seeing them in their feeds?
I think a lot of people are getting tired of seeing the posts and they have that really convient hide button now. I’m guilty of using it, a lot.
All the promote option is doing is guaranteeing that they will have your post at the top of your friend’s page and your friend’s friends will see your post too. Your posts will still show in your friends feeds, granted they haven’t hidden you.
*sigh*
and unfortunately when this all started taking place was when I began my Facebook business page. So you can imagine how very difficult it’s been to even get new ‘likes’ and get my posts seen out there to the public. I’m very displeased with this. But with things that deal with enormous amounts of public view it is bound to happen that Facebook will slowly throw in, here and there, costs for us Facebookers to fork out if we want to keep our pages. . 
I know it’s coming. AndFacebook will hurt greatly bc I truly believe business page owners will not stand for it. I know I will not!!!!
I run a few pages on facebook. For my business page, which actually showcases my products for sale, this is a huge annoyance and pisses me off. For my car seat safety page, this makes me absolutely livid. The information on that page goes out to local parents who are looking to keep their children safe. I volunteer my time and do volunteer seat checks. I do not make a penny off of this, in fact I quite often pay out of my own pocket to buy seat installation tools and marketing pieces so parents know how to reach me. Now I am expected to pay facebook in order to have this safety info reach more parents online? Mine is just one of many similar safety pages on facebook. Facebook has now put itself in the business of withholding safety info…curious to see how that plays out in their lawsuit happy society.
Facebook is ultra sneaky in almost every way. As a web software developer, I’ve seen their ways first hand. I’ve developed software that makes use of their Facebook Connect and Graph APIs to enhance user experience and interaction (and those are some pretty major and great tools), and I’ve seen the mighty hand of Facebook taketh away. Facebook has some great developers who work to make their product wonderful and useful, and then they have a bunch of executives, profiteers, and now shareholders that look to capitalize on the ideas of those great developers. Typically, because the money making side of an organization like Facebook is far less creative than the side that comes up with the stuff we all like, the way they capitalize on the creativity is by taking away functionality and forcing you to work around or pay to achieve what you have come accustomed to. It’s pretty much like your favorite restaurant changing the prices of the meal you ordered when you’ve already eaten half of it.
The problems, as I see it, is that their argument of justification is weak. They say, “This is a free service, how can you complain?” In reality, the service is far from free. I develop websites and software to integrate with their service, enhancing my users’ experience, but still driving traffic to their juggernaut. Their “free” services requires many hours of effort on my end to implement, and time is absolutely money. The only problem with my reasoning, they don’t get any money directly from my due to my efforts, so it is justifiable (from their perspective) to charge for what I originally developed for. Had I known I would eventually need to pay for this service, I wouldn’t have invested the time and effort to integrate my software with their systems. It’s a classic bait and switch.
The funny thing, I’m actually here on this post because I saw it on Facebook, ironic?
Well thank you for your perspective. I was actually amazed at all the whining about the cost! Everyone saying they are so concerned about “networking and staying in touchy feely with their fans”…No, they’re advertising and hoping to make some sales. You can use words like “networking” and “fans” …but please, the real effort you are making is to increase your sales. And why did you think that this was going to go on for free forever? I’m in business also, and I’ve appreciated the use of FB for the pictures and announcements that I can put up. But as I see business changing so rapidly, along with communication I know we all need to be ready to be slapped with another change around the bend.
But I’m glad you’ve shined a light on both sides and talked some sense. I just felt from most of what I was reading everyone just wants something for free….and yeah, wouldn’t it be nice.
The funny thing exactly…you saw this on Facebook, isn’t it ironic…don’t ya think.
Yes! I have been saying the last month or so “I don’t think our status updates have been reaching people’s news feeds!” This is very frustrating that they are now making us pay to socialize and network with our fans!
I knew this day way coming. I noticed as well as few months ago that my posts weren’t getting through properly as some on my BIG fans were asking me how come I didn’t post on my page anymore. IAt first I thought it was causes by the whole Open graf revolution where the more you click, the more you see the posts that you like. Now I know better.
So what are we to do? Close Facebook and start a revolution to stop changing it every single week? I’m thinking this is going to go just like gas prices.. It changes and changes but noone can actually do anything about … because we need it.
sigh.
I am not a small business owner, just a facebook user, and I too am disappointed in this FB policy. I “liked” all those pages, because I WANT their updates and sales and whatever news, I thought some people had just gone really quiet, now reading this, I have to realise I am just not one of the few who get the posts. How do FB determine who to send to? Am I not worthy of the posts too? REALLY annoying not only for the businesses but us as customers too!
KayJayDo, you can make sure to at least like or interact somehow with all the FB pages you want to receive updates from on a regular basis. According to what I have read, you will get updates from biz pages you are active in.
Yes, exactly!
I think you guys might be a little confused. I just read the following article and it doesn’t sound like they’re charging you to reach the fans that you already have. The fee that you could (optionally choose to) pay would be to reach and hit the news feeds of additional people that AREN’T on your fan list. But the people (ALL of the people) who are already on your fan list won’t be affected. Reading this article cleared it up for me. Hope it helps you too! (Totally put my mind at ease!)
http://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-debuts-promoted-posts–facebook-advertising-tips-2012-5
exactly….this is for people who aren’t your fans already…it is to help you reach more of the people who are friends with your fans. As a business owner I understand wanting to be able to have your posts promoted for free, but as a Facebook user, I will like a page when I want to like a page…and I get upset when my feed is clogged with information from pages I didn’t subscribe to.
I don’t mind paying a little but 5.00 per post is greed.
I knew something was up and got so frustrated trying to post just the right thing to get fans to interact, and then no interaction, I’ve almost completely stopped using my business page. My fan count has dropped as well, even with no posts for fans to see, and it’s not probable they seek out my page just to unlike it.
At least this explains things. Perhaps Google+ will be the new, better place to interact with fans.
Well this certainly explains a lot. Thank you for sharing this information. I guess our only problem now will be to firgure out if it is worth it to pay or do more on some other social platforms.
In the end I guess it just all boils down to greed for most of these companies.
Im a little confused why you feel charging for a service is greed. Why on earth should they provide it for free? It’s called running a business!
I don’t feel that way at all. Some of the other people commenting might, but I think Facebook is welcome to charge us– I just want them to be up front about it. If I had a choice (which I obviously do not), I would prefer that they not hinder your fan interactions, but rather that they simply allow us to choose which posts we do or don’t see on our walls. I wouldn’t even mind the promoted post fees if FB hadn’t limited our interactions beforehand just to give them leverage to now ask us to pay for access to people who have already opted to receive those updates. That’s all for me!
Wow, that explains everything. I had wondered what was going on, since I had just started building a new base of fans. I kept wondering about what would be part of the changes if facebook went public. Everyone deserves to make money doing business, but why not be upfront about it!!!
Thanks so much for letting us know!!!
Seriously this sux!! I was wondering what was going on! My page is really small but even I usually get a bit more “love” on it and lately nada! I loved the idea someone suggested of creating a FB style page for small business/blogs!! I am sure plenty of people will pay for their posts but being a blogger without the business right now that would never make sense for me!
Really blows!! Who is up for creating the page on our own? lol I will help! 
-Meesh
So much for “It’s free and always will be”
That is so incredibly messed up. No wonder they are being sued!
Have you thought about having a “friend” page just for your business? Such as your maiden name, and your parents address if you have to be separate from your identity now? Or if you’re not married have your business name incorporated as your last name? THen encourage your fans to be your friend? Then they can subscribe to see ALL of your posts…I think this sucks. I feel like I miss contests sometimes that I normally would enter, or things like that. That way your clientele doesn’t see your personal page, but you can ensure interaction? I’m just guessing, I don’t know if it will work. Good luck.
Thank you for sharing this! I have noticed a consistent drop off in sales and interactions with likers on my pages and this would explain why!! I am so mad. This morning I was even contemplating giving it all up because I’ve put so much effort into building my pages, stockists, and doing the legwork in registering a charity, yet it seemed I no longer had the support of my 2000-odd likers. I appreciate that Facebook provides me a free platform to conduct an online business, but I wish this had been disclosed to me before I put so much effort in.
I tried to go to the link and this is what it said:
It seems you have reached a page that no longer exists. Please visit the Ads and Business Solutions Help Center page for help with ads, sponsored stories, and Pages.
Maybe they are rethinking this??
Yes, we had noticed this however had wondered quite some time ago how long it would be before the payment process would begin (particularly with the then impending floating of FB on the stock market). It is a dilemma, as like you we don’t want to SELL to our FB likers, we genuinely want to interact with them in a personal way and in doing so are able to build a meaningful community whereby we can bring awareness to things about us and other businesses that is of genuine interest to our followers. Will follow discussion with interest. Edwynna xx
I hope you don’t mind that I linked this to my Facebook page to spread awareness. Although clearly I won’t get it to all of my fans, I wanted them to share, if possible. I had no idea!!!! Grrrrr!
Wow, this explains a lot! I have noticed a huge decrease in fan interaction lately. It is not a coincidence that Facebook stock just came out and they are also being sued!
I’m not using my FB business page like I should but have a link to it on my personal page & it was easy for my personal FB friends to find my shop from there. Now I see that since the horrible “timeline” that was forced on us my FB business page is invisable on my personal page.
FB keeps trying to push something called webees on me but I can’t get a decent answer on what that is. FB has because awful!
Wow, this is disgusting. I had noticed the “promote” button on FB, but I thought it was optional. FB is supposed to be free, a way to interact with friends and fans, as you say. If I want to pay for ads, I can do that, but I shouldn’t have to pay just to interact with friends and fans. There was a stink a while ago when somebody hinted that we’d have to pay to use FB and everybody complained and FB (or someone?) guaranteed that FB would always be free. I hope FB changes this policy.
Thanks for the heads up. I was feeling bad that there was so little action on my page, but had no clue they were pulling this stunt. I was advised some time ago to put my best effort into my web page and blogging, not Facebook because you never know where they are going or what they will take back after they give it.
I am VERY disappointed!I love the people that followed me on my page and really was working hard on building relationships with them. It makes me want to drop FB all together. I stuck so much work and time into building these relationships… I feel very deflated right now. I don’t have that many followers, but I took the time to thank each and every one that followed my page personally. FB is a Social Media Site. You are supposed to interact. I feel that this pay, or only half the people will see what you want to show them is really counteracting the whole social aspect.
I have my page to just share the person behind the shop. I don’t sell much, but I want the people to know me, to know who it is making these things they spend their hard earned money on. I’m not a big corporation. That is what I want to get across, but these promoted updates will curtail that goal.
Well, I am not sure, but I’m thinking maybe they are rethinking their mistake. When I clicked the link it said “It seems you have reached a page that no longer exists.”. Maybe they smartened up.
After reading through so many of the comments here I am completely blown away at the response to this action by Facebook.
Yes Facebook is a free social network but why do so many people feel that Facebook owes them free business services? Any successful business will have an advertising budget set, without it there’s little hope of that business surviving.
Facebook owes nothing to any business. If you are upset that they are charging for advertising then the best thing is to move on and try to find another free ride.
For those suggesting you make a personal page and use it for business, that is not a good idea and FB can and will shut it down. Also you can only have 5000 friends on a personal page. Some biz pages have much much more than that. I just read several other things but can’t seem to find the link ATM.
More info, especially #10: http://www.convinceandconvert.com/facebook/14-ways-new-facebook-betrays-small-business/
I agree with you wholeheartedly. And I have to disagree with some of the posters about what does Facebook owe to businesses? I don’t think that Facebook “owes” businesses anything. That said, if they truly didn’t want businesses to have a presence on FB, then they wouldn’t offer the service.
I don’t see anywhere on my page where t says anything about promoting it? Where am I supposed to look..
What happened to Facebook will always be free? You will not have to pay for it.. I do remember Zuckerberg saying this many times. Well I’m sorry I don’t consider this to be free. When I have to pay for something it’s not free. We are not HUGE corporations. We are small personal businesses. There is no reason that everyone who likes my pages shouldn’t see everything I list. They Liked my page for a reason. Not just so it would show up on there profile as a liked page.. I say we all go to his profile and message him. Yes you can message him. I doubt it will do anything but maybe him getting 200 angry letters a day will make him see it’s not right.
It will get worse, They (Facebook) are now being sued for allegedly lied about forcasted revenue.
They Will start milking businesses and if it’s not enough we will get spammed with advertising and then they’ll try to milk individual none business users.
It’s bad enough they decide what I see, they even decide what order I see it in.
Ok, now I see why I never see but a few people anymore. It’s the same people all of the time, no one different and not near what it used to be, some days I might get 6 comments whereas I used to have well upwards to 30, this is ridiculous, if people like me they should be allowed to see me without searching for me. There are so many that I have liked that I never see and forgot about half of them, what a shame, FB had gotten ridiculous! I am really disappointed with this. Thanks for sharing it.
WOW!! Good to know – as a self employed graphic designer, low budget advertising (I.e. FREE!) is always on the agenda. Good to know this stuff so I can adjust my social media game plan!
WTF? Seriously? I also noticed that my interactions dropped hugely… and it was always the same few people who DID interact. Seriously LAME. I’ve always hated facebook but use it out of necessity. I didn’t think it was possible but I think I hate it more now.
I am not seeing any info on promoting. All I can find is sponsored info. In the sponsoring you are paying for FRIENDS of people who like your page to see your posts. Am I just not seeing the promote info?
Right….I just read the FB page embedded in Lovespun’s story…..posted a recent article, no promote button showed up? I see the promote your page button, that’s always been there.
I am confused.
I think they are focusing on larger pages, and its incremental. So, some pages will have it already and others will later. And, small pages may never have the option. But, I doubt we’ll have more views just because we’re small and don’t have the option to pay to promote posts.
“I don’t want to advertise to my fans. I want to interact with them.”
That sums it up for me too.
I was wondering why my reach drastically took a nose dive, now I have to pay to reach my 5,000 fans?! this is so wrong, so wrong on so many levels. All that hard work to get an audience, but now we have to pay to keep their attention otherwise we don’t show up on their newsfeed!? I had a feeling that things were going to get bad once FB went public, this is not good at all especially for small home run businesses like myself. I agree that when one opts and likes a page it’s because you want to see their posts, this makes me downright furious.
I only have 200 fans and really don’t feel it’s worth it but… this does explain the lack of response to my recent sale! GRRRR Facebook FAIL!
It doesn’t seem to me that this is a bad thing. Facebook has used the “Edgerank” system for a while to set upt “Top Stories”, based on how much someone has interacted with my page before, how many likes etc. a certain story has gotten and age. This just allows me to jump the Edgerank queue if I want to really promote a story (like if I’ve got a big interview posted). I already promote my page with advertising. This lets me target that advertising to individual posts.
So, in my mind, this is a good thing. It’s status quo, but gives me some added flexibility. My only problem is that I can’t figure out how to actually do it.
Good example of contemporary business practices. First, build something people really want, better yet, make it awesome. Then do what you said you wouldn’t, stop doing what you said you would, and just keep squeezing profits out (at your products’, your services’, your employees’, and your customers’ expense) until there is nothing left.
I think this is so interesting. My albeit small fan interaction has gone down to.
What I don’t understand is that if I don’t connect with my fans the first time I come up in their feed do I not get to come up on their feed again for a while?
It’s because Facebook is now a publicly traded stock. They are going to milk it as much as possible. Its first day $38 dollars a share by day 3 it dropped to $33 a share. Not good! They will want your money, there are hungry wolves to feed (so to speak). Time to find a new avenue… Pintrest is here to stay! Google has validated them and that means it can never disappear! (it’s still free for the time being)
Well, that explains THAT! I believe that what is behind this is the fact that Facebook went public, tanked, and now wants to make its money back. Well, they won’t get it from me. I personally have hated every time they’ve changed Facebook, their so-called “improvements” have done nothing but confuse me (& everyone I know). And just when I thought I knew how to use it, they would change it again. Now they want to charge me $5 to send my updates to all of my fans? No. That’s it, that’s my answer, “No”.
This is why I wrote the post about not using your newsfeed, but interests lists instead. It makes sure you get the updates you want regardless of whether you interact with the pages. I can only hope that people add me to their lists because I’m not likely to show up in their newsfeeds.
http://preservingwonder.com/2012/05/page-visibility-on-facebook/
I totally agree with you.
When I ‘like’ a page it’s because I wanna see ALL of their posts, if I didn’t, I wouldn’t ‘like’ their page in the first place.
Also I agree that I don’t wanna pay to have fans. I am an one woman business, a SAHM, I wanna interact with my fan friends, talk to them, show them that I am but a woman trying to survive chronic illnesses, household chores, being a wife, and at the same time, a business woman.
I wanna them to tell me about their new babies, how they didn’t sleep, how they got spat on, how they had to feed all their 5 kids and put them to bed before sitting to craft their craft.
Maybe we should start our on hangout.
Thanks for the article.
My sentiments exactly, I love my fans, many have become friends, I don’t care if they buy from me or not, I enjoy talking to them, hearing what is going on with them, hearing their opinions, I am not paying anyone to show someone that liked me what I have to say, that’s insane< I am not Wal-Mart, like you, I am just trying to make it and survive some chronic things myself, but they are making it very hard.
https://www.facebook.com/help/promote
“If I don’t promote my post, will the people who like my Page still see it?
Nothing has changed about how your posts are shared with the people who like your Page.
A lot of activity happens on Facebook and most people only see some of it in their news feeds. They may miss things when they’re not on Facebook, or they may have a lot of friends and Pages, which results in too much activity to show all of it in their news feed.
If you don’t promote your post, many of the people connected to your Page may still see it. However, by promoting a post, you’re increasing its potential reach so an even larger percentage of your Page audience and the friends of those interacting with your post will see it. ”
It does not say it will not put it on peoples feed. it says if you pay will will make sure people see it in there feed.
This very much echoes my feelings on the matter. I’d rather just pay a nominal fee for having a page than a per post fee so that I hop past edgerank’s wall between me and the people who liked my page in the first place. I’m not surprised this has come to pass because I have been watching a very sure but certain drop in interactions and I have friends who are also page followers who have mentioned not seeing anything new lately, i.e. Facebook pushed my posts so far down they had no idea they existed anymore.
For the people who say “Facebook is a business, get over it” – I think it’s the way they’ve gone about this that bothers people. What if you paid for advertising in the first place to reach your audience? And now you can’t reach them anymore?
More to the point what if instead of finding a way to create a product that fit an existing need, you created the need first? Because that’s what it feels like Facebook did here. Rather than offering advertising to reach a larger audience, they made it difficult to reach your audience and then offered a way for them to see you again. That’s what leaves the sourest taste in my mouth personally.
“More to the point what if instead of finding a way to create a product that fit an existing need, you created the need first? Because that’s what it feels like Facebook did here. Rather than offering advertising to reach a larger audience, they made it difficult to reach your audience and then offered a way for them to see you again. That’s what leaves the sourest taste in my mouth personally.”
Yes, yes, yes!!! That is EXACTLY the best way that I have seen it articulated so far. I feel like they are holding our fans ransom. It’s very frustrating indeed. Thank you, Mark!
YES! Well said!
girl – I’m so relieved! I thought they just didn’t like me anymore!! lol – just kidding – but – seriously – non disclosure is just wrong & the whole idea behind fb is supposed to be – like you said- interacting with fans & friends – not trying to sell them something!
If they’re going to start with this big pile of BULL, then they should definitely do what any other profitable business does. GRANDFATHER. Anyone that is currently a page owner, should be grandfathered in. No charges what so ever. Anyone creating a page from a specific start date should pay the fees. That way everyone is happy. Shame on you Facebook. I understand things change, but if they’re going to change so drastically, then do it right!
I totally agree. Small businesses, local businesses, and “I do this on the side” kinds of little businesses are not going to be able to afford to pay to promote their posts on a daily/weekly basis. They’ve worked hard at building up a place to connect, share, and quite frankly have a pretty good time with them (outside of normal business operations) over on Facebook. I’m terribly disappointed in Facebook charging people to talk to their already exsisting fans. The local bookstore, the local coffee shop or bakery, your local spa, your favorite photographer for your kids – they are all going to be on the losing end of this deal.
I’d much rather that Facebook was just honest about wanting the money, chanrging some kind of small monthly fee perhaps based on the number of fans. Almost anyone can afford $10 or $20 per month and Lada Gaga can pay according to her own fan base size. The pricing scales that way which is what Facebook would really want to do anyway. As it is now, people must think that their fans are either suddenly totally not into their content or getting disinterested in droves. It’s just not right. Imagine just how many thousands of page owners must be in the dark about all of this.
I never really minded the ads or the *optional* ability to purchase ads. Suddenly, a business page doesn’t really have much choice do they? Those Facebook fans really are being held hostage. I for one don’t need Facebook to thin my personal feed or content at all. I do that myself already with the options they have available. I liked pages to see them. I chose carefully based on the kinds of posts that I saw on their pages in the first place so that I wouldn’t get spammed. Didn’t you?
Google+ is looking way better all of the time. What a shame.
I”m gald to see so many here discussing this. Infact I have been a little disapointed that major tech blogs havn’t and are not pointing out the fact that Facebook states it is not a requirement however if you do not pay, your reach to your fans will amost be nothing maybe even less than 10%. So you tell me how it isn’t a requirement. More like extortion.
I couldn’t imaging sending an email to people then yahoo or google deciding which of those people where going receive it, but that is exactly what facebook is doing.
At least most of you have the option to pay to promote a post. Our fan page with over 560K fans doesn’t even have this option yet and we have no idea what it will even cost us to reach all of them. But in the past 48hrs we have seen our reach go from and average of 20% down to under 10% with our last post only reaching 5%. Our fan page wasn’t free, we have spent a lot of time any money promoting and building our fanpage to the size it is today. We don’t sell products, only post contnet wich drives traffic back to our site. From that traffic is how we make our revenue, from ads.
We live in the day and age of Facebook and that is how people prefer to get updates and contente sent to them. Our members/users don’t want emails or use rss feeds. They wait for it to come to them threw facebook, like we all do at this point.
We have a lot of fans but we are by no means a large compnay and our traffic has gone from avg. 20k visitos to 5k in the past few days. At this rate we will be lucky to keep the doors open for a month. It’s clear now that facebook as been limiting our reach to our fans for some time because we generate the same amout of traffic now if not less with 560,000 fans as we did six months ago with 250k fans.
Most are reporting a fee of $100 per post to reach the majorty of their fans. I’m affraid to even think what facebook will want for a fan page with 500k+ fans as most reports are coming from fan pages with much less than 100k fans. I can tell you right now we would have a hard time afroding $100 per post because on avg we post to our fan page six times per day based on feed back from our users.
We toally understand facebook is a buisnees and need to turn a profit more so now than ever before with the stock not doing well. We would have no issues with paying facebook a monthly fee of some sorth based on number of fans similar to constant contact. But paying per post and then have it show up has sponsored post. No Thank You!
We hope Facebook re-thinks this one and fast before they put us out of business.
I feel the same. FB really could give us better options. I would be willing to pay a monthly fee to reach my customers. I think that they missed the boat here. You will not be able to voice any concerns as there is no way to talk to anyone. I think that FB is going to fall apart soon and take us all with it… It is unfortunate as it is such a great tool, but I think it is time to find another way of communicating with our customers…
It’s a sad day when you post a photo to your page and then check your own newsfeed and the picture you shared on your own page is so irrelevant to you that it only appears in the ticker.
Gosh, if it’s irrelevant to me, imagine how few of the people who liked my page will get to see it…
Sigh, this is why I’m putting more effort into growing my email list now. Facebook is jumping the shark after all. I hate it because if they would just show what there is to show rather than manipulating the feed, I would otherwise like the site.
I would read all the comments, but that would take forever. I agree with most of you guys and totally see facebook’s point of view too. I’m disappointed that things are not the way we would like them to be, but facebook is still the best tool we have to reach our clients.
It´s sad that they´re not surfing form site to site, blog to blog anymore. Most of the time they´re there. Checking on status updates and eventually seeing one of our updates.
What drives me nuts ar the numbers facebook shows me. I don´t understand a weekly reach of 25000 people when I only have 45 visitors on my page a day. What is that all about, you know? Many people share the pictures I post, but I still don’t get it.
That´s why I´m afraid of paying U$whatever so that 10000 people see something I post. I don’t understando their crazy math at all!!!
Does anyone else feel the same?
Best wishes from Brazil,
Bruno
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