(Hypebot) — We already know that most of your Facebook posts never get to your fans. Now Meta is splitting its Feed in two, and the Main feed – the one that appears when you open the app – is entirely driven by algorithm-based discoveries from Reels, Stories, and other content.
If this new Main feed feels much like TikTok, it’s supposed to.
There is a second Feeds tab which includes a chronological feed of recent posts from friends, groups, people things, and Pages that you follow.
In theory, that’s good news, if – and it feels like a big if – fans click on that tab.
“One of the most requested features for Facebook is to make sure people don’t miss friends’ posts,” Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote in a Facebook post announcing the changes. “So today we’re launching a Feeds tab where you can see posts from your friends, groups, Pages and more separately in chronological order. The app will still open to a personalized feed on the Home tab, where our discovery engine will recommend the content we think you’ll care most about. But the Feeds tab will give you a way to customize and control your experience further.”
How to fight back
Instead of writing posts, create short vertical videos and post them as Reels on Facebook.
Next, prioritize collecting email addresses from your fans. You control those – not a third-party social network. There are plenty of mailing programs like MailChimp that will help you.
Bandsintown – which has always let you message 100% of your fans without filtering – recently added email collection to the same free widget that tens of thousands of bands already use to share their tour dates online. They are also testing a 100% free drag and drop email program and are expected to make it available to all artists in the coming few weeks.
Start today. More as things develop.
MORE: 3 legal Bandsintown Hacks I’ve used to book hundreds of live shows
Bruce Houghton is the Founder and Editor of Hypebot and MusicThinkTank and serves as a Senior Advisor to Bandsintown which acquired both publications in 2019. He is the Founder and President of the Skyline Artists Agency and a professor for the Berklee College Of Music.
