Think about the last time you posted something to your Facebook wall from your your phone. Did you see an option to “add a link?” If you did, congratulations: you’re part of a small group of users that Facebook has rolled out a new function for. If you’re like me and it’s nowhere to be found, don’t worry, we’ll have it soon.
Link sharing on mobile devices is—to put it nicely—clumsy at best. If I’m browsing through Safari on my iPhone and see something I think my friends would enjoy, I’m stuck searching for a share button. If I can’t find one, I have to copy the link, open up my Facebook app, and then paste the link and hope that Facebook recognizes it as a post I’m trying to share. Roughly 70% of the time it doesn’t work correctly and I have to search around my house for my laptop, find the link again and then go to Facebook and share it. It’s a pain in the ass to say the least!
Now Facebook is trying to alleviate these issues...but how?
Although still in testing phase, Facebook plans to add a search engine-like feature to its mobile app that it hopes will increase social shares. This is where that “Add a Link” part comes into play. If you choose to add a link to your Facebook post—or article, for those not sure what is fully meant by “link”—all you have to do is click that feature and type in a query.
BAM! Search results.
Based on the term(s) that you entered into this search, a list of results will quickly pop up (similar to searching on Google) with those that have been shared the most showing up at the top. So, if you can’t quite remember the site or title of that awesome blog post you just read, but you remember what it’s about, Facebook just made it that much easier to find it and share it.
Will this affect Google?
The effect that this new feature will have on Google depends on one thing and one thing only: how many people use it. As stated above, right now people typically have to use an outside source (such as Google) to find content that they want to share. Facebook is simply trying to eliminate the middleman, which has the potential to take away some search traffic from Google and the other search engines.
How will this be helpful for my business?
Shared content drives clicks. Not only will this new Facebook feature allow for you to more easily share awesome content on your business’s Facebook page (as well as your own personal), but it will also allow visitors to your blog to more easily find and share YOUR content when they’re browsing Facebook on their mobile app—which, let’s be honest, most people are doing multiple times on a daily basis. And in case you didn’t know, Facebook is by far and above the biggest source of social referral traffic online...as in it drives 4x as much traffic as the second-best source.
Need help developing your Facebook and overall social media marketing plan? Contact an Inbound Strategist at Marketing Essentials today! You can reach our office at 419.629.0080.
