Understanding Facebook’s Post-Sorting Algorithm

Facebook’s News Feed is sorted by an algorithm that many people call EdgeRank.

It seems like every week, a Facebook expert discovers that one type of post or another generates greater reach or engagement. Many believe that photo posts are the best, while others feel that plain text status updates are the most effective way to get the message across to most people.

But just like most other things about social media, there’s no golden rule. As Loomer notes, the best kinds of posts are the ones fans tend to interact with the most — whether that means links, photos, videos, or status updates:

A year ago, we all said that Facebook favored photos. So everyone shared photos. Then the new flavour of the month was text updates. So everyone shared text updates.

The motivating factor in each case: reach.

You should never let post type drive your content strategy. Your focus should always be on quality, no matter what the post type.

Maghsoudi at PostRocket put together a detailed infographic, explaining how this algorithm known as EdgeRank works, so have a look through and figure out how you can improve the reach for each of your future posts!