Hey there, welcome back to Let's Talk Social, where we demystify the ever changing landscape of social media so you can focus on what really matters, connecting with your audience and growing your business. I'm Rich Haik, your guide through this digital maze, and today we're tackling a big one, the death of organic reach.
It's a phrase that sends chills down the spines of marketers and business owners alike, but is organic reach really gone or has it just changed shape? Today we're exploring what's happening, why it's happening, and most importantly, how you can adapt. So grab your favorite beverage and settle in, it's about to get real.
Let's start with a little history, Organic Reach, that glorious time when you could post on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and your content would actually reach a decent chunk of your followers. No ads, no gimmicks, just good old fashioned connection. Fast forward to today, and Organic Reach has taken a nosedive.
On platforms like Facebook, organic reach for business pages is estimated to be only around 2 5%. Instagram, slightly better, but not by much. So what happened? Algorithms happened.
Social media platforms started prioritizing meaningful engagement and personal connections. Quote unquote. That's corporate speak for pay us if you want people to see your stuff. And let's not forget the sheer volume of content. In 2023 alone, it was estimated that over 500 million Instagram stories were shared daily.
With that much noise, even the best content can get buried. Honestly, it's a bit like shouting into the void, except the void is also selling ads and somehow making millions of dollars off of you. Before you start throwing your hands up and declare social media a lost cause, let's take a step back. You know I'm a believer in it.
Yes, organic reach is on life support right now, but that doesn't mean it's dead. It's just evolved. Here's the good news. The algorithm is not your enemy. It's actually trying to do its job, show users the most relevant and engaging content. So instead of fighting the algorithm, let's figure out how to work with it.
Relatability, consistency, and value are now your new best friends. Think about it. When was the last time you liked, commented, or shared somebody's post? It's probably something that made you laugh, taught you something, or made you feel something. In other words, people still want content. They just want the good stuff.
Take TikTok. Its algorithm is notorious for giving even small creators a chance to go viral. Why? Because it prioritizes engaging creative content over your follower count. Alright, now we've mourned organic reach and seen the light, let's talk strategy. How do you thrive in this new world? Gone are the days of posting five times a day.
Instead, aim for fewer, higher quality posts. I say this all the time and clients look at me like I'm crazy. Use high resolution images, snappy captions, and videos that tell a story. Make sure you ask questions, encourage comments, and respond to every single interaction.
Engagement is like catnip for the algorithm. It sees people interacting and starts chasing, and it boosts your content even more. But don't put all your eggs in one social media basket. If Facebook is tanking for you, maybe LinkedIn or Pinterest will shine. Test, learn, adapt. As we always teach a B test.
Whether it's a Facebook group, Discord channel, a fun newsletter you send out, having a space where your audience can connect directly with you and each other is invaluable. Is organic reach really dead? Not exactly, it's just playing hard to get.
But with the right mindset and strategy you can still make meaningful connections and grow your brand in the process, what we all want. Thanks for tuning into this episode of Let's Talk Social. And if you enjoyed it, be sure to subscribe, leave a review, and share it with your fellow social media warriors out there.
And hey, if you've got questions or topics you want me to cover, slide into the DMs, digitally of course. Until next time, keep creating, keep connecting, and keep thriving. We'll see you soon.
All right. So we're back to the wrap-up casual thoughts. And wanted to talk about this episode specifically because we provide organic social media content as a service. And. That does create a bias. I'll be the first one to say that, but. I don't think the craving from. The everyday person that goes on social media is going to go away. I, we've seen a shift ourselves and what I was talking about, and that's why I put all of that in there, which is you can't get a post to even get some organic engagement sometimes.
And it's really annoying because the platform gets on and says, Hey, who's going to give me the most money. And. For the free post they're like, no, you don't get anything. So then the advertisers are fighting for 80% of the space and it's understandable. They have to make money and everything, but the. Other part of the understanding thing on the, on their side is that it's free to post on the app.
So there. Like they're there to make money, but I feel like they've drifted from the original intention of creating the thing, which is to. Connect people with other people. And if businesses were just not allowed, that's an idea for a social media platform right there. That's a good one. No business has allowed.
If you make a single business post you're like you got like a 24 hour timer on you. You're not allowed to post anymore. And that post gets take down. But they've totally deviated from the original intention of social media, which if you remember, like Zuckerberg, Was essentially the spearhead of this MySpace.
I don't consider social media necessarily because it was just like profiles. It was like social media without the feed, essentially, or like social media, as we know it today. But he created that for college kids to like offense, essentially flirt with each other and meet each other and to go through all of that.
And. The social experiment while not perfectly, historically accurate is entertaining and gets most of it. When it comes to that stuff. And it's a good watch if you haven't seen it, it's about the beginnings of Facebook and the legal battle that they get into. While creating the app because they break off from two other guys that were just mega wealthy dudes.
And so they were funding everything while Zuckerberg and his friend with the coders. And they go through all this like digital warfare, essentially to compete. And yeah, so it's just total deviation from the original intention and they've just become entirely money hungry. And I get their point of Hey, this is free.
And for you guys to post here and we don't have to show you anything, but. I see the consumer side too. It's Hey. Th this is not what we signed up for. And this is not what we were getting ourselves into. And sadly enough, like most everybody's addicted to tech talk or. Insert your social media platform here.
Like for me, it's YouTube. I watch a ton of YouTube every day, mostly podcasts and that kind of stuff. But at night before bed, My wife might be doomed scrolling on tech talk, but I'm watching like either shorter, longterm, YouTube. Long form YouTube videos. And what I appreciate about YouTube. Which I could easily see Facebook and the other apps going to this.
I couldn't, I can't even imagine if tick-tock did this, but it could happen. But like with YouTube, you pay 12 bucks a month and you never get an ad again. And basically, so I haven't seen an ad in like years on YouTube. And I'm always shocked when someone else is pulling up a video to show me. And they're like, oh, hold on, we've got to wait five seconds.
So we can skip this ad. And I'm like, oh my gosh, I forgot. That was even a thing. But at least it's like a five second pre-roll on something that could be three hours long, 10 minutes long, one minute long, whatever it is. And YouTube shorts. Is starting to implement ads as well, just like Tik TOK and Instagram.
So I don't think they're an angel child by any means, but. Yeah, it just makes you. Makes you angry and just curious as to like why all of this is happening and as far as a yes, no answer is organic social going to die. I think it's gonna be a no, I think the human just humankind, craves that interaction with each other and I've got another episode coming up. That I think you guys will really like. And it's going over, how more bots are going to be posing as real people.
And it's talking about how Metta just shamelessly posted the other day that they are going to be just. Making fake bot profiles and sit in those out there. And I'm probably going to talk about this in the post show as well for that episode, but they're just making bots and having them have fake profiles, fake. Big pictures, fake bios they'll post on stuff.
They'll comment on stuff. And it's just going to like totally mess up advertising space and also make people. Even more addicted because they're going to get like more dopamine hits. And on top of that, it's like worse. Cause they're fake ones. So if there's like someone that's generally unpopular or even has an unpopular opinion, that's actually bad. These bots can come in and comment.
And then that person's oh, people like me. When I do this, I'm going to do more of that. So it's just a Curious thing. In general, that whole episode and it's coming out soon. So stay tuned for that. But as far as organic social goes now, I just, I don't think there's any way around the human psyche, unless you go and listen to my tick talk, getting banned a video where I talk about. How they could do some like very long term manipulation to make you see certain content that makes you act or feel, or do certain things. Act and do the same thing.
That's my bed. But yeah, make you just manipulate you essentially. And I think that's totally possible. And that's why I like YouTube so much is because you get to follow creators. And there's a lot of flies on the wall. Like people that just watch, they don't post a lot of content, but Like having the creators, like they get their own channels and they've got their own bans and they have YouTube strikes and all that stuff where they have limitations and whatnot, but they can actually build a large audience and. It's it can be like in any direction about any topic that like, I love watching this guy named beard meets food.
He, all he does is eat a ton of food at different restaurants, all around the world. And it's actually a really cool channel. Just you go check them out. But that's why I don't think organic is going to die. It's just like that video content form is when it's from a real person. I don't think there's going to be YouTube videos anytime soon.
Anyways. Where there's whole channels that now they're ran by bots because they have tons of those were bots, just scrubbed content from the Joe Rogan podcast or whatever, insert popular podcasts here. And they just make clips and then post them off to a random channel. But we're the actual person behind the camera.
Quote, unquote is. All bots and all just totally fake and like tricks people well enough to where they don't even know that they're watching a bot. So I think YouTube is going to be way farther down the road in terms of being able to trick there. Audience, not that they would do that, but being able to it's Google, so who knows? But not that they would do that, but. They're going to be way further down the road than Facebook.
Whereas like it's all just static content and you can throw out pictures and start commenting on stuff and make someone fall in love with you just by a bot, engaging with you for a year. Because there, there are people out there that do that. Watch catfish. Um, yeah. And then. I guess just to wrap it up.
As far as like getting around this problem and. Not having so many ads and businesses feel like they're being cheated out of what they deserve when it's organic content, people feeling like they genuinely support a business and never see them on socials. Even like my own family members, they never see my stuff and I tell them about it and they're like, oh, I didn't even know. I think the only way around that is to go back to our roots of either super, super limited ad space. Go to a subscriber model where people can just pay. 10 bucks a month and they don't have to see him anymore.
And then all their friends and all their local businesses that they follow pop back up in their feed, which like, if we think about it, that'd be cool. Or. We just have an app that doesn't allow ads at all. And it's I was talking about earlier. Like I think that's not a terrible idea. But that's my rant on all of this.
So again, if you made it this far, thanks for reading. Appreciate any support you want to give me if you want to like. Like this blog, follow our page, subscribe to our YouTube channel, share this with a friend, whatever you want to do. Comments help big time. Give me your opinion on all this stuff.
And if you've seen similar things, if you're a marketer, especially inside of the organic decline and how paid ads have just become more forced down your throat with all of the marketing agendas that we create. Appreciate it. Have a good one guys. Thanks.