A Few Facebook Facts {Get a Cup of Coffee First}

This is not normally something I do - I'm not any kind of expert on how to use social media, especially Facebook! This post got a bit wordy, but please bear with me if you are interested in learning a teensy bit about the latest Facebook changes. In fact, this requires extra coffee, so we'll enjoy a new cup between each paragraph - LOL! With recent changes, I started digging around a bit and figured out a few things that might be helpful for my people {Hey - that's you!}. :)

Let me address Facebook pages {blogs, websites, businesses, etc.} first - if you're only interested in personal profiles, I'll have a tip I discovered for you at the bottom of this post. Facebook pages seem to be the latest with changes that are causing grumbling. First, many people have shared that when you "Like" a page, you need to hover over that button and when the options pop up - make sure that there is a check next to "Show in News Feed." Honestly, I don't really think this is a new concept - just presented in a new way. You've always been able to choose to hide pages from your news feed or choose to show them again. I checked through many of my pages and all were checked to show in my news feed. But this does *not* mean that you will see all of that page's posts and updates all of the time!

How often posts and updates appear in your news feed are determined by Facebook. They have some sort of lovely algorithm {yes my son - math really is used in other places besides school - LOL} that determines how often and when you see things. All I do know is that the more you interact with a page, the more Facebook knows that it's important to you so you'll see more of the updates in your feed.

• For pages that you want to see more of - be sure to click "Like" and leave comments on statuses and links that are shared! 
• If you haven't been seeing a page for a while - stop by that page's wall and interact there. 

Makes sense, right? Facebook can't read your mind {yet - LOL} to determine what you like to see all the time unless you give it clues.

And of course there's the new number of people reached and percentages. After looking into those numbers a bit, I discovered something. Number of people reached and the percentage listed are *not* the same thing so they may not match up.

• If you hover over the number of people reached, you will see two categories of people: organic and viral. 
• Organic includes people who saw your post in News Feed or the ticker or on your wall {people seeing it on your wall might not always be "Likers"}. 
• Viral includes people who saw the post through friends that liked or commented {some of these probably aren't likers of your page either}. 
• The percentage reached is the percentage of your Likers {only} who saw the post. 

So if your number reached is higher than the percentage reached - you are reaching people beyond just the fans of your page, which is a good thing. Of course you want your percentage to be high, but you can only do so much because if your fans aren't on Facebook when you post - they won't see it unless they scroll way down in the news feed or come over to your wall and look. Or if they haven't interacted with you in a while, they may not see your post in the news feed at all. So *when* you post on Facebook can be very important for your reach - which brings me to the next Facebook change!

You can now schedule your posts on your Facebook page!! If you know that there's a time when most of your fans are on Facebook, but you won't be, schedule a post for the future! You could use this to schedule posts a couple times a day to hit the morning and evening readers; to schedule reminders about giveaways closing; to schedule timely tips, and so much more!

• On your page, where you type in your status, link, or photo - there's a little clock in the lower left corner. 
• Type in a few words as your status {but don't post} so you can see what I'm talking about. 
• When you click the clock, it asks for the year you want to schedule {you can also backdate posts}, then the month, the day, the hour, and the minutes. 
• Then instead of "Post", your button will say "Schedule" - click that and your post will happen at the selected time. 

Very handy! Are you going to try scheduling some posts?

Whew - got all that??!! Now for your personal profiles - I discovered something that I had seen before and forgotten about. Ever wonder *why* you are not seeing all of your friends' updates in your News Feed? 

• Pick a friend and go look at the wall - hover over where it says "Friends" and a menu will drop down. 
• Just below where it says "Show in News Feed" {which you want to have a check next to it} - you'll see the word "Settings" - click that. 
• Now you see that you have options of how many updates you see from that friend. Guess what the default setting is? It's for "Most Updates." No wonder!! 
• Click on "All Updates" so you can keep up with your friends better! 

Of course, there may be some friends that "Most Updates"  is a good option for or you can even select "Only Important."  So you do have some control over how much you see!

I hope you had sufficient caffeine to get through all of that! And I do hope that it was helpful to you! Again - I do not claim to be any kind of Facebook expert, but as I found out a few things I wanted to share with my friends. I'm not promoting or endorsing Facebook - just trying to better understand some of the options there. And of course anytime I complain about Facebook, my hubs says something great - "Wow honey, you really should get your money back." :) Yes, all these blessings of friendship, connections, promotion, and growth are all *free* and *free* is good.

You can always come see me at Stop and Smell the Chocolates on Facebook so we can try to find our way through the Facebook maze together! :)

Also - I found a great post with some more helpful info on making Facebook lists - from Jo Lynne at Musings of a Housewife - you might want to check it out.

This post linked to:
 ~ Works-For-Me-Wednesday at We Are THAT Family

Now go rest your brain and have a blessed day!!