I’m old enough to remember life before the Internet but young enough to have embraced it fully. My husband and I have blogged vacations and our years with exchange students, I have my own website that I regularly (ish) update and not a day goes by that I don’t scroll through Facebook. While I am not involved in a multi-level marketing business, several of my girlfriends sell everything from tea to makeup. Lately, each of them as posted, on one or more of their pages, a similar message about the mysterious “Facebook algorithm”:

This common post, and ones like it, while meant to increase engagement, are actually diminishing your reach.

What Is The Facebook Algorithm?

Without getting uber-techy, an algorithm is complex math that determines what content is valuable to whom. The more valuable, the wider the reach. As the internet gets smarter, algorithms of major sites are tweaked to improve UX.

Traditionally, and especially in the early days of Facebook, its algorithm was set to gauge the value of content by engagement: likes, clicks and shares. At the time, this made sense. The more likes something gets, the better it probably is. The more shares, the more worth people must think it has. That worth can be anything: a cute video of goats playing on playground equipment or a recipe for meatballs stuffed with cheese are both valuable in different ways.

Just like people figured out that Google used keywords to rank content and started stuffing, social media marketers realized that engagement increased their reach. That’s why so many momtrepreneurs include posts that ask you to post a GIF in the comments. It’s a fun way to get people to engage. It’s also why people who regularly go live on social media will include in the audio and caption to “like, comment and share!”

But Facebook has explored an important question: is content valuable simply because people engage with it? Just like Google came up with limits on keywords (going over 3% is considered “stuffing” and gets you penalized), Facebook has tweaked its algorithm. Anything considered engagement bait is getting penalized. That means in order to keep getting seen you’ll need to make sure your posts are valuable and that that is the reason people engage with them, not simply because you have friends who always click “like” or pop that GIF in the comments.

Are Your MLM Posts Harming You?

The first thing you’ll want to do is audit your posts to see if you’re using “engagement bait”. There are three categories of baits: vote, react and share. Do you engage in them?

Vote Bait

If you post and ask people to vote on a product, style or anything else by using the thumbs up, heart, laugh and wow reactions your posts will be flagged. Doing this occasionally won’t kill your reach: Facebook is looking for serial offenders. But there is still a penalty and your page could get on the radar.

React Bait

This is like posting vote bait. Instead of voting it asks for a specific demographic to like or love the post. “Like this if you’re single; love it if you’re engaged.”

Share Bait

Giveaways are great and valuable, but requiring a share to enter a giveaway is a no-no.

So what’s an MLM to do? While it might be easy to say you don’t care and think the rule is silly, knowing that this penalty is happening can be valuable for your biz. First, altering your behavior puts you ahead of those who are not going to change. Second, there’s some wisdom to the change. Thinking about it honestly and changing up your posts could lead to more authentic engagements and thus an increase in sales.

Why The Algorithm Tweak Makes Sense

Did you see this frightening expose on Cracked.com? *shudders* This is part of why the change is coming. It’s easy for people to pay for engagement. While most multi-level marketers cannot afford this, it’s easy for them to post engagement bait. Getting friends and family to like those statuses is a great way to increase engagement. But, let’s face it, it doesn’t say anything about what is shared.

Posting “share a gif with how you are without your morning coffee” does not add value to those who see it. Posting an article about how to make your favorite Starbucks drinks at home, however, does. Asking for a GIF comment of people’s favorite Halloween movie doesn’t provide much value. Posting a graphic of every time Hocus Pocus is airing Halloween weekend does. Rather than ask for likes, get comments through GIFs and have reaction-based votes, Facebook is looking for posts that get engagement without the bait.

How To Proceed With Your MLM On Facebook

Rather than include, “Like, comment and share!” when you post, create posts that are likely to be liked, commented on and shared without the nudge. I watch a woman do her makeup live on Facebook every morning. It’s valuable content because I learn from it. She doesn’t have to ask me to like or share it, I do it because her videos are instructional and attainable. She’s a mom who likes makeup; not a pro. She speaks to her audience as someone who is always learning and that, right there, is engaging. I comment on her videos because she responds both during her live and by responding to every comment in the thread later on. So if I have a question about a brush or technique I know that she’s seen it and that I’m going to get an answer to my question. She has even reached out via messenger with extra info. She doesn’t need to tell me to share and like because she is producing valuable, daily content.

If you’re using Facebook Live (and you should be), you can mention likes, comments and shares, but take it out of the text of your post. Instead ask yourself when posting: what would make people like, comment and share? Here are some ideas.

People Like…

Video content

Tips and tricks (especially graphics)

Information (how to use a product three ways you never thought of, upcoming sale)

Memes (the occasional, well-placed, timely meme is an engagement booster)

Instead of asking for the reaction, build your queue to include informative, entertaining content that is helpful or funny. Note the posts that get the most reactions and post more like that.

People Comment…

When asked a question

When they have a question

Instead of “comment with how you’d use this bag” use, “How would you use this bag?” – people respond to question marks. Another question is, “Do you have any questions about this product?” Or “How do you use this product?” It’s simple to reframe requests for comments with questions that leave the request to comment out.

People don’t like being asked to tag a friend, and those are getting penalized by Facebook so avoid them in your marketing.

People Share

Recipes

Tutorials

Strong Narratives

When users believe content is interesting to a wider community, they share it. You don’t have to ask. Instructional content is likely to be shared, especially if it’s quick or a hack of some sort. Think of those great recipe videos or easy crafts people share. The other thing that will always get shares are posts that evoke emotions through narrative but remember, most people use Facebook to gain information over gaining feels.

Keep posting, but rather than asking for engagement make sure you’re posting things that naturally get a response. This change increases your organic reach. Your competition who fail to make the changes will drop in visibility. And don’t forget, everything we’ve blogged this month is about SOCIAL MEDIA – so go back and learn some great tips.