Facebook Video as a Means for Reaching Audiences Organically

With Facebook's recent announcement dealing with upcoming changes to one of the internet's dominant platforms, many questions arise for marketers. Most of these questions have an underlying theme, "How will changes to organic content affect my business page?" Organic reach for businesses has been declining year after year because platforms want to gain profit from advertising. Now that organic content is more and more infrequently displayed to your audience. Let's explore how you can increase reach through video.

On Facebook, photos typically perform better than regulars posts, but video usually ranks the best of all three formats. To try to get around this algorithm, many people are uploading short videos, typically only a few seconds long, of an image to tap into the organic reach of video. Although these videos perform better because of the format, they can be a nuisance to your audience because when they see a video, if there is a play button, they expect some motion picture or audio and not a stagnant image. If your brand is continually annoying your audience, they will unlikely unfollow your page, and you will no longer even have the option of reaching them at all. So now, hotel social media strategy or any business marketing strategy, for that matter, should continue to have a mix of formats when it comes to posts. Although photos and posts may not reach as many people as the video format, it is a familiar staple that your audience recognizes and will receive favorably as they will not be bombarded with video after video. Keep in mind that the content of each post is more valuable to your viewers than the format is, so continuing to provide value should always be at the forefront of everything you do.

That being said, the video should be incorporated more heavily into your social media marketing strategy now that Facebook has announced the shift in the algorithm, which will focus on personal connections rather than branded content. Although resource-intensive to produce, video is one of the best options for marketers to gain organic reach. Everything from a slideshow video to a Facebook Live Video consistently ranks higher than other non-video formats.

With that in mind, let me introduce you to some of the best apps to create quick slideshow videos that will help in gaining organic reach for your brand.

Flipagram - This simple app lets you upload photos or videos from your phone's camera roll and turns them into a slideshow. You can also add effects, music and remove the watermarks from this free app for a one time fee of $1.99

Snapchat- If your brand already incorporated Snapchat into your social media strategy this trick will be perfect for you! Once you post a story, be it a stand-alone photo, video, or a mix of both, you can save it on your camera roll within 24 hours of posting and later upload these "stories," as now videos, onto different platforms.

Instagram - If you've been following recent updates, you're probably aware of Instagram stories. If you add a story to your profile, you can save this onto your phone's camera roll, even if it's just two photos, with or without any of the effects, and it will be automatically turned into a video.

Although the last two apps aren't intended for video creation, they are great options for brands that already incorporate these popular social media channels into their strategy. They can re-post the content they create across various platforms when they download it into a video.