Secrets

Remember when you were a kid and you and your siblings, or you and your friend(s), had this huge secret you didn’t want anyone to know about? You’d do the pinky swear thing, or a special handshake, or some other ritual that meant certain doom for the person who broke the promise and shared the secret they’d just sworn to carry to their grave?

What I have to say today isn’t quite that dramatic.

It’s not good though either.

Facebook has rolled out more changes today. In addition to forcing authors to pay to boost posts if they want more than just a handful of followers to see them – and even then, they just show them to a small fraction of people who have liked a page – now they have bots policing our posts.

If we ask for an opinion from readers, if we ask for advice that isn’t something like a police emergency or regarding travel, if we do much of anything that encourages you to comment or like a post … Facebook will start limiting our visibility even more than they’ve already done.

So my post last month that said something as simple as “white lights or multi-color lights” (or something like that) would have me flagged as a spammer. If I did something similar another time or two, they would consider it ‘engagement bait’ and my page would be ‘demoted.’ Meaning even fewer people will see my posts.

A quote from an article letting authors know about this new change pretty much says it all.

“All of this means that Pages that post promotional creative should expect their organic distribution to fall significantly over time.”

It goes on to say that if I post about a new book release, possibly even new blog post notices (my interpretation of the article), only a fraction of friends and followers will see it.

Because, apparently, it’s considered engagement bait – and engagement bait is only acceptable if we pay Facebook to boost those posts. 

So I’m going to try to do better with my blog and ask that those of you who enjoy talking with me check in here regularly because we can chat in the comments section here just as easily as we can on Facebook – and no one will be policing my post with bots that might misconstrue everything I say as spam or engagement bait.

So anyway, there you have it. The reason behind my weird Facebook post. I just felt like I needed to fill you all in on what’s going on and why I haven’t been posting as much as I used to. Most of you haven’t been able to see them and we’ve (authors) known this newest change was coming for a couple of months now.

Don’t forget to talk to me in the comments section below please. 🙂

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4 Responses to Secrets

  1. kathryn tozzi says:

    WOW, I wondered where you have been. I miss seeing your posts and following along.

    • Kristy K. James says:

      I’m sorry, Kathryn. I’ve obviously NOT done as well as I’d intended with the blog – but I’ve been busy researching and trying to get outlines done for the Haunted Depot series. Not a great excuse but time just flies so fast sometimes – and this is one of those times!

      Yeah, the whole Facebook thing has been very frustrating. On one hand, I appreciate that they’re trying to deal with all the spam. On the other hand, they should leave author and business pages alone. Next, word is they’re going to be targeting private groups. So authors are scrambling trying to figure out what to do to stay in contact with everyone. Blogs and newsletters seem to be the only way to go.

      I will try what I see some people doing … and it seems to be working. That is, posting something unoffensive to FB … and then posting what I want in my comments. 😀

  2. Diana Layne says:

    I must’ve missed this. Is this one of those links you sent me today that I haven’t read yet?

    • Kristy K. James says:

      It might have been. I don’t have a clue. If it didn’t happen in the last few hours, I’ve probably forgotten. 😀

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