Facebook has recently made some huge updates to its interface, changes neither users nor brands have necessarily embraced. In fact, parties from both sides have expressed being downright irate over the tinkering. The tweaks that have most of the community in a frenzy are those related to the news feed, which as we all know, is one of the most important components in the Facebook experience. For marketers, it all results in an increased importance of building relationships on Facebook, so this article will discuss how you can do so and maintain amid the news feed changes.

Make Your Content Trendier

According to Facebook, it made changes to its news feed for one reason – to make status updates more relevant to the user. The company believes that users want to hear from their friends more than the brand pages they like, so those updates are more likely to appear in the new category known as Top Stories. Theses stories are considered the trending topics the user wants to keep up with, so if you are going to reach them through the news feed, you want to make your content as trendy as possible. Whether it’s sports, politics, or other current events, taking the trendy approach can help you earn higher placement in the feed. This trendy content doesn’t necessarily have to be related to your brand, but if you can somehow tie it in, then that’s even better.

Think Engagement

With the Facebook news feed changes in effect, using the platform to actually engage your audience is now more important than ever. The EdgeRank algorithm it utilizes to present updates to the user serves up posts based on a number of different factors, and relationship to the user is believed to be one of the most important. So for example, if a friend publishes an update that receives a lot of comments or likes, that post is likely to rank high in the user’s news feed because Facebook deems it to be important to them. This means that the more engaging your posts and the more action they generate, the more likely they are to reach your fans via the news feed.

Call for Fans to Share Your Content

It was discovered that due to the recent Facebook changes, content that is liked within the network will no longer appear in the user’s news feed. This is a big deal and one that could make it much harder for brands to grow by reaching the friends of their fans. There is, however, a solution to the problem. You may not be able to reach those friends like you could in past times, but you can get to them by convincing fans to share your updates with those friends directly. When taking this route, try not to make a habit of making such requests, and more importantly, make sure your content is worthy of sharing with others so they feel compelled to do it on their own.

The Facebook news feed update has been the central focus of many discussions, and the more the online community talks about it, the more we learn about the implications. If you utilize this social platform as a marketing tool, we highly recommend staying on top of all the latest news surrounding the changes.

Google recently announced a search algorithm update that should promote fresher and more relevant search results. Although Google makes over 500 changes to its algorithm annually, the majority of updates do not affect a large percentage of search results. The new update, which seeks to build on the Caffeine web indexing system, will affect approximately 35% of all search queries.

Amit Singhal, one of Google’s primary engineers, said the following on The Official Google Blog:

“Given the incredibly fast pace at which information moves in today’s world, the most recent information can be from the last week, day or even minute, and depending on the search terms, the algorithm needs to be able to figure out if a result from a week ago about a TV show is recent, or if a result from a week ago about breaking news is too old.”

In 2007, Google first discussed a portion of the algorithm known as “Query Deserves Freshness” or “QDF.” The QDF portion of the algorithm, which utilizes intent analysis, has been activated in the past for search queries such as sports scores, news, natural disasters, disease outbreaks, seasonal holidays, live events, and other similar types of search queries. For example, if a search query is for “upcoming LA concerts,” Google understands that the search results should not include concerts from last year. The new algorithm change is designed to better understand the searcher’s intent and apply a formula similar to “QDF” on a larger scale that will impact more search queries.

While skeptics of the newest algorithm change are concerned that Google will show preference to less relevant “fresh” content rather than an older authoritative page, Google is aware of this possibility. Google has indicated they understand that different search queries will require varying degrees of “freshness” based on a searcher’s intent.

Since Google results were outdated for many search queries, users have been turning to Facebook and Twitter for more relevant “fresh” results. Google is hopeful this new algorithm change will provide users with the timely information they are looking for and prevent them from losing traffic to social media competitors.

[Sources Include: The Official Google Blog & ZDNet]

I’m so over the email signature. Enough already.

What tipped me over the edge was an email I received this morning. It was easily half a page long and included two different Facebook icons, two different Twitter icons, links to three separate websites and a graphic image of the Las Vegas strip inviting me to Register Now! I was so distracted that I could barely read the message, what with all the shiny eye-candy tempting me to click here or there and share something else.

To throw salt into the wound, this afternoon I spent 10 precious minutes looking for an email attachment that I could not find because of all the email signatures that are attachments in and of themselves. Why, why, why is this necessary?

If your email signature meets one or more of the following criteria, skip the aspirin and go straight for the sedatives:

• Includes attachments of any kind. Seriously, stop it.
• Reads like a short story. No one cares.
• Blinks, rotates or moves in any way. Enough said.
• Directs me to more than 3 links, 4 tops. Aggregate or aggravate.
• Uses color to make your point. The color blind are not amused.
• Attempts to be overly clever. Because you’re not.

Do what you want with your private email but when it comes to business, mind your personal brand. Your professional email signature should be just that – professional. Remind people what you do, make it easy to contact you, and offer a few thoughtful links for more information. Period.

Sima Dahl    Sima Dahl on the Web RSS Feed

This article originally appeared on Parlay Communications | From Message to Mindshare and has been republished with permission.

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