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Low Interaction
I notice how little interaction there is on social media these days. I’m in a bunch FB groups that have tens of thousands of members but there are only 3 likes and no comments on most posts? Or maybe sometimes 1 spam comment and 6 likes. It’s interesting to see how little interaction there is. Is that how it is or is there some kind of algorithm that decides how much I see? Do I have low points? Do other people with more points in the same group see posts with 74 comments and hundreds of likes? Or does everyone just join a bunch of groups and never contribute anything to them? Wouldn’t Zuckerberg be smart to add some kind of incentive to users to be more active? Wouldn’t he totally benefit from that and wouldn’t that make the experience better for everyone?
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9 Replies
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All new posts need a flair going forward
byu/JonODonovan insocialmedia -
I can’t imagine that your points would prevent you from seeing facts such as likes and comments. The demographic you’re reaching may be too busy or unfamiliar with participating in the topic your posts are about. They could be nervous to make public posts. I think it’s pretty common to have a lot of people join but not follow through in participation, I’ve seen this happen with a new subreddit. Maybe sometimes joining a group is a similar compulsion to online shopping- it creates a little dopamine boost to press that join button, just like clicking “place order”. That’s a good idea to have more incentive or reward for the people who join your group. Have you noticed that on YouTube for instance people really really love content that is inspirational or encouraging in some way? It gets so much love, comments and likes for the built in reward, that if people join they get to see more encouraging things that make them feel safe, secure, and inspired that there may truly be a way their dreams can come true.
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Anecdotally, I’ve noticed a big drop in engagement across social media. I’ve wondered if people are generally sick of screen communication after a year of being forced into it.
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I’m pretty sure most people lurk, in general.
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I thought that too one time. but then boom. I post something for free or funny (This works always)
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I’ve worked in FB/Insta and general social media for 10 years now. Look, its the dilution, thats the issue. Its just going to keep going like that as we are slammed with more more more more.
Facebook has pushed the groups SO hard lately that everyone is in 500 groups now, about 3 years ago the average was 20, now its 500! So think of it like this:
2015, youve got a country with 5 million FB users. Each of them are in 50 groups and spend about 1hr a day on FB – thats about 1minute per group per day they’d spend on average.
2020, youve got same counotry with 5million FB users. Each of them are in 500 groups, spend 45min a day on FB now (cas it sucks) – they now spend, on average 5 seconds in each group.
Then there is the way the algorithm only shows posts to people that are already super interacted with, and you end up with most groups having almost no interaction or low interaction.
Same with pages, without paid boosts you get almost NO comments anymore, 5 years ago you’d get so many even organically. FB’s buttons “do you have a thing? create a page for it here in 4 clicks” just made the net full of stupid pages.
There’s just too much, the ratio of people and how much time they spend, vs how many places there are to spend it/interact is just wayyyyy too much these days.
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It’s also a matter of time of year. It’s summer now, kids are getting out of “school”, and many cities and countries are opening things more widely again. I expect a general drop in engage in groups/many digital communities this time time the year.
That’s not the full answer but I’d suggest it’s a contributing factor. There is tons of research on email open rates based on the calendar and early summer tends to trend well for certain outdoor categories. Many social platforms probably see the same fluctuation.
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A lot of factors are involved in the interactions decline around social media in general. On the creator’s side, it could be the content that’s having a problem magnetising interactions. But it’s not always the case. For example, like what you’ve mentioned, the algorithm could be one reason. Posts with most number of interactions end up being shown to more audiences, leaving those with little to no interactions at all behind the line. The advantage of paid ads or content can also contribute to it, mainly because they are from paid platforms and are capable of reaching more people along the way. And, it can also be attributed to the users themselves. Maybe, they spend lesser time now off social media due to restrictions getting loosened, plus social media detoxification.
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It’s common to experience up’s or down’s in post engament. Also, if you are posting something then not all your followers are going to see that post, your post will be instantly visible to only those who interact with you on a regular basis if the interaction is low or they won’t use their social media much often then your posts will go down in their timelines.
