Making Facebook work for you

There’s as much science as there is art to a good Facebook post.

A three-year research project funded by Wine Australia has revealed – in great detail – how important it is to think about what you post, when you post and, most of all, how much you post. And the key messages are relevant to other forms of social media.

The work was carried out by Rebecca Dolan for her PhD in the School of Business at the University of Adelaide. Over a full calendar year, she collaborated with 12 wineries across 7 regions in 5 states to assess the public response to their Facebook activity. This involved analysing more than 2,200 posts that attracted nearly 5,000 comments and in excess of 48,000 fans.

The processing involved a rigorous content analysis of each post, including identification and coding of each and every word, every image used and the specific content of each video. This information was collated with engagement metrics in order to understand how and if any specific piece of content within a post would influence the way in which a Facebook fan chooses to engage with the post.

‘In terms of coding the post content, the results were quite polarising’, Rebecca said. ‘Posts were either heavy on the sales and product push, or focused on behind the scenes, more entertaining content without the sales pitch. Regardless of the strategy, engagement rates were low.’

Central to the research was to acknowledge that Facebook engagement can vary in intensity – and it’s not all positive. Rebecca developed six categories ranging from actively creating new content in response to a post, to more passive positive responses and – at the other end of the spectrum – responding negatively to a post or even openly ridiculing or condemning it.

The aim then was to identify how specific actions, such as writing a positive comment or un-liking a page, were facilitated by the type of post made. To do this, Rebecca defined posts in one of four ways:

• Informational posts aimed specifically at delivering category-, brand- and product-related information
• Entertaining posts provide light-hearted and fun or humorous content and images, details about the weather, events, interesting and fun facts, food and produce details or images of animals
• Relational posts appeal to users’ needs for social interaction by asking the audience questions, providing fun quizzes and questions and posting photos of customers or staff members
• Remunerative posts relate specifically to the offer of economic incentives to users, this can include price details, special offers, giveaways and contests.

The common theme, however, was that ‘information overload’ exists even for positive and light-hearted posts. Users reach a point beyond which they simply do not pay attention anymore and may even respond negatively.

‘In many cases it was found that ‘less is more’, with users often scrolling past and failing to engage with any content that has more than three or four key pieces of informational or entertaining content’, Rebecca said. ‘And they were even less tolerant when it came to the amount of remunerative content.’

The final project report is available here.