For a year now, there has been a lot of fuss around the algorithm of Facebook and Instagram, among others. Not everyone gets to see everything anymore, and before consumers have your attention, you have to spend money on ads. This is likely to have a huge effect on your marketing strategy. Currently, you have to fight with other organisations for the attention of the target audience.

Algorithm

Facebook announced in early 2018 major changes to the way it shows content on users' timelines. An algorithm now determines the way social media shows its content. Does my interest lie in jeans? Then chances are that an algorithm will start showing me more jeans on my timeline in the future.

 

Content

Facebook's goal is simple: show the best content to the most relevant person. Therefore, as a business owner, you will need to ensure that the content you create is good and matches the information needs of your target audience. It is good to know where your ideal website visitor is online and what content they like to access there. Choose how often you want to publish content and what the ideal length is. SerpIQ research, for example, shows that the longer the content is, the more likely it will return high in organic search results. On the other hand, you should not make content unnecessarily long. However, it is important to make content relevant and strong. The target audience ultimately determines whether the content is good or bad. Once your content is read a lot by the target audience, Facebook will reward you for it. Want to know more about writing the right content? Read our blog Successful Online - Content.

Inhakers and algorithm

Besides creating good content, there are more ways to beat algorithm, according to Thijs Waardenburg and Komala Mazerant. They explain this in their book 'Catching up with social media in 60 minutes'. According to them, this can be done with 'inhakers'. Inhakers are expressions that quickly pick up on current events, news items or other events. By responding to events in your content, you get publicity faster. It turns out that inhakers generate more engagement than non-inhakers. Over 17% of all brand expressions on social media can be seen as inhakers, according to research by Mazerant, Willemsen, Kamphuis & Van der Veen (2017).

Faster interaction

With the rise of social media, we have the ability to react enormously quickly to new events ye. Social media itself ensures that good catch-ups will quickly be widely shared. With a clear link to current events, catch-ups stick better, are funnier and also connect better with people's perceptions. On social media, funny catches can quickly go viral and thus be shared hundreds of times. This means a lot of positive and cheap publicity for your brand. Predictable moments, such as King's Day, Easter and the Olympics, are especially popular to pick up on.

Effective inhaker

How do you make sure your inhaker is as effective as possible? Coosto recently conducted research and listed the characteristics of an effective inhaker:

  1. Topicality
    Example post heineken hooking on social media

    Example post Heineken catching on social media

    Note that if you are catching on to a news event, the news is still relevant when you catch on to it. If the attention for the news has already waned, there is also no point in following up on it. Good timing is very important in a good hook-up. Catching up at times you can expect in advance such as events or holidays are easier.

  2. Positivity

    The purpose of a good inhaker is to evoke a postive feeling. With wordplay, you can surprise people or make them laugh. A good inhaker is never heavy or critical but rather takes the audience's side.

  3. Relevance

    Make sure the inhaker is relevant. If there is no possibility of catching on to something because it does not suit your business or target audience, it is better not to catch on at all. Pick a few topics per card that suit you and go full on that.

  4. Originality

    This is the hardest requirement for an effective inhaker. Let your creativity run wild. Look around at competitors for some inspiration. To stand out from your competitors, you need to give the inhaker a clear tone-of-voice by expressing the content in an original way.

  5. No commercial message

    Selling a product via an inhaker doesn't work, because people puncture through this. Think of it as a deal: you make people laugh, they give you the reach you hope for. So do not mention a URL to the online shop or an offer.

Inhakers zijn een waardevolle toevoeging in jouw content strategie. Dus onderzoek de interesses van jouw doelgroep en verplaats je in ze. Haak zo snel mogelijk in op de actualiteit en probeer hier een originele draai aan te geven. Let ook goed op het tijdstip wanneer je de content post en ontdek hoe effectief jouw inhakers zullen zijn.
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