There have been rumors as to Facebook charging for years. While they claim they will never charge for your profile or basic page, they just went public and are seeking ways to monetize (make money from) their network so they can bring in more profit for their investors. This is where sponsored posts come in.
As a business owner or blogger, you most likely have or need to start a Facebook page to connect with your current and potential clients, customers and readers. While the idea of Facebook charging for advertising is not new, and they did have the sponsored stories feature, the idea of prompting you to pay to promote a page post is new for small business owners. (Larger brands had the opportunity to test the feature in beta). Even now, you still need 400 fans to access this feature.
Facebook claims that paying will promote your post to more people than would have normally seen it. However, early reports from small business owners have shown decreased page traffic if they select not to promote the post. Then there are some who claim that regular posts got the same amount of traffic as paid posts. Overall, the general consensus so far seems to point to the fact that people are not happy with the current offerings of this feature. I think it’s fair to say that people would hope to have the same traffic as before if they choose not to promote and that if they do choose to promote, they would see a lot more traffic on their posts.
How exactly does the feature work? Well, you go to post on your page and select the Promote dropdown button next to the privacy button. You select your total budget to promote and the campaign will run until it reaches your budget limit. You will be billed through PayPal or credit card. If you pause or delete the post, then you only pay partial. If you want to edit it, only the admin who created it can edit it. You can go back and promote posts up to three days old.
For instructions and more info, you can check out what Facebook has to say about promoting this way here: https://www.facebook.com/help/promote
What are your thoughts on this new move from Facebook?
I noticed this feature a few days ago, but I was unsure of what to think of it. I post daily, so if I actually wanted to pay for my posts, that would be a significant amount of money per month. I’m hoping that enough people express concern over this feature so that they either eliminate it or improve upon it.
now the tests are over and the system has gone gone worldwide, very disappointed. i run facebook page with over 30K of followers, if I use the promote function, I get 10% more reach, all fine and good a few more likes of the post it self maybe not very significant amount all told, but if you look deeper I do not not gain new page likes actual I get a large increase i un-likes for my page.why this is all promted post mark sponcered facebook users do not like stuff pushed on them through friends etc, fine but not really stuff paid for.
So why should i pay to prompt my post, I cant think of a reason, unless facebook actually promotes to Followers who actually like to see my post Ie. like the fist 10 to 15% who do for free anyway, why pay for more and shoot your self in the foot and loose followers of your page.
never going to use again unless there is a significant change. if i post very regularly I can get the same reach with out the negative affect of a sponsored post. What are facebook thinking.