Facebook is a walled garden (you have to login to access content only on Facebook) and the promise of Facebook content optimization has not materialized. When Facebook reduced news feed reach due to fake news scandals etc, it was a nail in the coffin for content sharing marketing addicts. Instead of littering the Facebook feed with often meaningless brand or product updates, Facebook Business Manager provides a very useful resources for customers of brands. That is, helping users on Facebook locate a store, ring the store and show the store location on a map. Sounds what Google Maps and Google My Business does right? YES it does.
So when Zuckerberg announced in the official post of when News Feed was changing at Facebook in January, I’m sure the team down at Google chuckled at his comment:
“Since there’s more public content than posts from your friends and family, the balance of what’s in News Feed has shifted away from the most important thing Facebook can do — help us connect with each other.”
In recent months, we have been shifting our retail store network clients to focus on Facebook Location Store Listings inside Facebook Business Manager. While a little funky to set up, the tool allows stores who are busy serving customers in store to have a dedicated Facebook URL set up as part of the process. There is a nice toolset inside Facebook Business Manager to conveniently manage all locations and we will be tracking over time the impact of page visits, store visit and conversions as do Google with driving directions and phone calls to stores.