Tech Whisperer

The slow painful death of organic reach

Social media marketing is a beast for many, many reasons. It is absolutely necessary to tell the story and create the voice of your brand, but is also an endless grind of frustration. Not to mention the constantly changing landscape where you’re seemingly at the mercy of a bunch of robots and their algorithms (side note: you are).

If you’ve ever thought to yourself, “boy it feels like my post performance stinks and nobody is seeing it,” I’m here to let you know there’s a really good reason for why you feel that way … because it IS that way. Organic growth continues to get crushed by both Facebook and Instagram. Facebook’s average reach clocks in at a whopping 8.6%, which is also down 9% from last year. Meanwhile Instagram’s reach is “better” at 13.5%, but that’s also off 29% from the year prior. Not exactly the kind of numbers that make you think, “hey let me spend a bunch of time on my social media pages!”

TECH WHISPERER

By Zack Jackson

So, what the heck do we do about it? First and foremost, you need to shed the concerns about any of the vanity metrics given to you by these platforms. Ultimately, what does it really matter how many likes or comments a post gets? What truly matters is your business being successful and making MONEY. Start thinking of your content with that filter … does this post tell the story of my brand and invite my audience to take action? If the answer is yes, then you’ve done the right thing regardless of what some algorithm tells you.

Second, it comes back yet again to the OWN YOUR AUDIENCE mindset. This is something we preach over and over again to our team. Don’t sit there and rely on Facebook or Instagram or TikTok or (insert next trendy app here) to arbitrarily decide how many people will see your post. Instead, figure out ways to collect direct contact information of your audience and use it to your advantage. Because guess what happens once you have this information? YOU own it. And you own it FOREVER. You don’t have to beg and plead with the compu-bots to let your audience have access to your content. Instead, you get to be … GASP … an actual human communicating to other humans!

Does that mean you should totally abandon social media? Absolutely not. It’s still a great branding tool, but it can’t be your only tool. The important thing is to have reasonable expectations for social media performance, and then to use it in a way that gives YOU the power to engage with your audience on your own terms in the future.

By Bonnie Chavez Executive Summary:

You have the power to engage with your audience Executive Summary: on your own terms in What my MBA taught the future. Own it. me and what I actually do, is very different.

Bonnie Chavez is the CEO of Building Beloved Communities, a local consulting firm specializing in community-centered business solutions. Her driving force is to help all organizations overcome business barriers with a lens focusing on smart solutions that benefit the community. Zack Jackson is Bonnie is a proud lesbian, co-founder of The JPG Latina woman who values Agency small business her family, roots, heritage, creative firm. Reach him at and culture. zack@thejpgagency.com.

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