Facebook users are publishing content via their mobile devices at an ever increasing rate.
Facebook has over 800 million monthly active mobile users, with that number continuing to grow. However, there haven’t been many new ways to publish content for Facebook Pages via mobile.
But still, most page admins do not use the mobile app or mobile Facebook website to post content.
We think they should reconsider.
How Do Mobile Facebook Posts Perform?
In an exclusive study, EdgeRank Checker has revealed that approximately 5% of Facebook Page posts are posted via a mobile device (tweet this).
Clearly most Facebook Page content comes from Facebook.com or a third party app.
The brands that are leveraging mobile, are experiencing a distinct increase in engagement. The typical mobile post has 39% more engagement than a post from a non-mobile device.
Engagement per fan jumps from 0.38% to 0.53% simply by using a mobile device.
*Using a mobile device includes the official Pages Manager for iOS, as well as posting via m.facebook.com
Is Mobile Posting Causing Increased Engagement?
We likely cannot prove any causation here, but let’s take a closer look.
Driving engagement (likes, clicks, shares, and comments) is the best way of succeeding with Facebook content, as it increases the opportunity for more exposure as well as a higher likelihood of showing up in the news feeds of people who engage with it. This is fundamental.
We’ve used Reach in the past to identify how EdgeRank is impacting different Facebook content types. This can help reveal what Facebook is weighting more heavily, or not, in the newsfeed.
We examined how Reach is impacted by posting through mobile. Looking at the numbers showed a negligible difference when compared to the other formats.
Reach is flat.
Is EdgeRank boosting mobile posts? Most likely not. It appears in this situation that EdgeRank is not giving a lift mobile posts.
The increased engagement, but very equal levels of Reach, highlight the likelihood that these posts, from mobile, are simply more engaging.
In the future, we expect Facebook to take into consideration things like geo-proximity, but the algorithm is not quite yet that complex. For now, we have two assumptions about why this mobile content is performing better.
1. Mobile app users might be more savvy. They are more likely to be community managers, professional social marketers, and in general more tech savvy. They want to use the tools that make it easier for them to post to their Facebook page.
2. Mobile content is more engaging. If you can post quickly, on the go, from outside the office, and outside of work hours, your content has more range and you have more freedom to post more engaging content.
Posting content to your Facebook page from mobile may not give you an edge, but it might help us think smarter about what content is engaging users. Assume posting high quality content and content in-the-moment provides a good opportunity for success.
What Should Facebook Page Admins Do?
For most brands (63% of them), they experienced an increase in engagement when posting via mobile.
Brands that have the ability to publish content “behind the scenes” or “on the scene” should absolutely take advantage of the power of mobile. Snapping a photo via the Page Manager app for iOS, applying filters, and updating timely messages can increase the opportunity for success with your brand.
As always, content is king.
What better way to capture awesome content as it happens, than via mobile? Take advantage of this opportunity, and keep us posted on your results.