Real Estate Facebook Best Practices 2019: Part 2

By Jessie Trapp, Marketing Coordinator 

We’ve all been there – you share a post on Facebook one day and it generates tons of likes, comments, and shares, yet the very next day your next update gets zero engagement across the board. It’s incredibly confusing and frustrating, so much so that it can be tempting to throw in the towel altogether. So, how do we standardize and, better yet, GROW the amount of engagement we generate on the channel?

There are several factors that play into how Facebook ranks your content and, in turn, how much engagement your posts generate. Here are a few of the major guidelines you should be aware of:

Real Estate Facebook Best Practices 2019: Engagement types.

The Facebook algorithm sorts every action your posts receive into two different buckets: active engagement and passive engagement.

Active engagement: A person engages with a post in a way that others can see. This includes commenting on posts, sharing posts, and reacting to posts. This kind of engagement is great if your goal is to increase your post’s reach and overall engagement.

Passive engagement: A person engages with a post, but not in a way that can necessarily be seen by others. This includes clicking on links, watching videos, and hovering over/previewing content. This is good if your goal is to have people simply consume your content or to drive people to your website by clicking on the links in your posts.

We aren’t the only ones who keep tabs on how many likes, comments and shares a post gets, Facebook does too. Specifically, it focuses on how many times followers actively engage with your posts. The more your posts receive this kind of engagement, the more Facebook assumes the content is interesting and valuable, and the higher the posts will be ranked. The higher your posts are ranked, the more exposure they’ll gain among your followers, their followers, and their followers’ followers.

How to increase your levels of active engagement.

In order to generate higher levels of active engagement among your followers, think of your Facebook page as one giant storybook. The more pictures, videos and images there are, the easier it is for viewers to follow along with the story, leading them to be more likely to engage with it. This is why Facebook favors visual content as opposed to other kinds of content such as simple status updates and links.

A few more variables to keep in mind:

Authenticity. Although Facebook likes engagement, it doesn’t want any old engagement – it wants it to be authentic and organic. Facebook is smart and can recognize when content asks people to engage in a spam-like, misleading way and quickly bumps it down in its lineup. This includes activities such as repeating posts, click baiting, and like baiting, so keep things real and avoid these poor practices.

Keep it simple. According to Hubspot, 88 percent of people use Facebook on mobile devices. If you want to encourage followers to engage with your content, you need to make it easy for them to consume. In addition to using visuals, keep the copy in your posts short and sweet.

Know when to post. Facebook bases its News Feed off of an algorithm that recognizes the time of day that you post, which contributes to where the algorithm places your content. Utilize the insights Facebook provides to gauge when your followers are the most active and post accordingly.

Invest in Facebook ads. Strategizing around this algorithm can only take you so far. Facebook is so crowded these days that leveraging Facebook ads is essential in order to develop any kind of significant following on the channel. Find a tool that allows you to put your ads on autopilot so it doesn’t become a tedious task on your to-do list.

Hope you enjoyed more Facebook best practices 2019! Click here to review part 1.

Need more tips on making the most of your real estate marketing? We’re here to help.