Video usurps photos for brand reach on Facebook

Facebook posts that include video now have a wider reach than photos, according to Socialbakers research.

Research released today (17 Feb) shows that when measuring average organic reach on brand pages, photos show the poorest performance after video, status updates and links.

While photos are most used as a post type according to Socialbakers data, they show half of the reach than that of video. Video reach measures at 8.7%, while photos have fallen to the bottom of the list with 3.7%.

The same pattern was shown when Socialbakers measured the organic reach for brands’ fans, with video fan reach showing results of 5.7% while photo reach is at 2.3%.

Socialbakers says: “Not long ago, photos were the best way for brands to reach their Facebook fans. But now, according to our data, photos are still the most common type but they are not the most effective.”

Despite this the social analytics company warns brands that although the influence of photos for engagement may be declining, it’s important not to take the research as prescriptive advice.

“You still need to ensure that your content is high-quality. A great photo post that gets good engagement will likely see continued News Feed reach, while a poor-quality video post is going to get buried,” the blog post says.

Photo posts have become popular in the past year with social platforms such as Instagram showing high levels of engagement. The trend may stall as social media platforms including Instagram itself, invest in video as it proves to increase user reach.

In September 2014, Comparethemarket’s associate director of marketing told Marketing Week that it was likely to continue using Facebook’s video service as it’s initial campaign showed a 13 point lift in ad recall, from 10 per cent to 23 per cent.

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