5 Social Media Algorithms Marketers Need to Know About in 2022

Have you ever wondered why those pesky social media algorithms exist? Though it may seem like they gatekeep your content, algorithms aren’t out to get you or hide your content from the masses. Let me paint a picture for you.

你与数百人——也许even thousands — on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. But when you log in to each of these social networks, it's likely that you don't want to be bombarded by every single update from every single connection. That'd be pretty overwhelming, wouldn't it?

这就是这些社交网络中每个人的感受的方式 - 他们已经进行了大量的用户研究来验证这种感觉。实际上，这就是为什么新闻源（以及其背后的算法）存在的原因。bob官网官方网站

当今三个最受欢迎的社交网络都倾向于基于算法的供稿，以为其用户创造更好的体验。麻烦是，每种算法的工作原理不同。更糟糕的是，它们不断变化，使像我们这样的营销人员很难跟上。

To help get it all straight, we've put together this simple guide on how the news feed works on the three most popular social networks: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Let's dive in.

Note:Keep in mind that the algorithms are constantly changing. We'll continue to write about major social algorithm changes as they happen.

Essentially, social media algorithms analyze user behavior and prioritize content the platform believes the user wants to see and is most likely to engage with.

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News Feed Algorithm

每个主要的社交媒体平台都有自己的“新闻提要”样式算法的版本。bob官网官方网站在下面，我们将深入研究Facebook，Twitter和Instagram的Feed算法的细节，但这是对这些平台的算法在优先级列表内容时的概述。

Engagement

当您首次在社交媒体平台上创建帐户时，您更有可能看到可能与您的兴趣不符的随机内容混合在一起。但是随着时间的流逝，您会发现内容将更符合您的兴趣。这是怎么发生的？

Social media platforms begin learning your interests and preferences very quickly based on what kind of content you engage with. Once a platform has a good idea of what a user is likely to engage with, they are going to prioritize that type of content in the user’s feed.

Time on Platform

Why does what you engage with matter so much? Well because the more time you spend engaging, the more time you’re likely to spend on a platform. When you spend more time on a platform, you’re susceptible to see (and buy from) advertising that is shown to you. And the more time you spend engaging on a social media platform, the more insight that platform has into your preferences, purchases, and habits.

Now let’s get into the details of how the Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram algorithms work.

Facebook's News Feed Algorithm

Since the inception of the最大的社交媒体平台to date, Facebook's news feed has been focused on personalizing the social media app's user experience.According to eMarketer, we spend about 34 minutes each day using the platform.

To give users the best experience possible, Facebook's team of engineers are constantly studying user behavior and picking up signals that show what kind of content each user is most interested in.

How It Works

The Like button has always been the epicenter of Facebook's user experience — not only because we see it on everyone's posts, but because it allows us to personalize our experience (and influence everyone else's). Since it was first introducedin November 2007, it's helped Facebook's engineers figure out which posts were delighting users, boring them, offending them, and so on.

Nowadays, the algorithm that governs Facebook's News Feed has become much more sophisticated. It isn't just about the Like button anymore — and not just becausereaction buttons are now in the mix. In fact, Facebook's algorithm is by far the most complicated of the three social networks covered in this post.

Here's a quick rundown of the most important things Facebook's algorithm takes into account.

Relevancy Score

When picking posts for each person who logs on to Facebook, the News Feed algorithm takes into account hundreds of variables — and can predict whether a given user will Like, click, comment, share, hide, or even mark a post as spam.

More specifically, the algorithm predicts each of these outcomes with a certain degree of confidence. This prediction is quantified into a single number called a "relevancy score" that's specific both to you and to that post.

一旦每个可能出现在您的提要中的帖子都被分配了相关得分，Facebook的分类算法将它们排名，并将它们以最终出现在您的供稿中的顺序。这意味着，每次您登录时，您在新闻源顶部看到的帖子都会被选为数千个其他人，因为最有可能使您做出反应和参与的帖子。bob官网官方网站

Ads are given relevancy scores, too, so that Facebook can show users the ads that could matter most to them. Again, this is supposed to give users a better experience — but it's also helpful for the businesses that are paying for the ads. It's calculated based on the positive feedback (video views, conversions, etc.) and negative feedback Facebook expects an ad to receive from its target audience. (Learn more about relevancy score for Facebook adshere.)

Prioritizing Friends

Before 2015, Facebook was predicting what users want to see on the News Feed based on more indirect signals, like Likes, comments, and shares of others. Eventually, itadded options for users to filter out posts they don't want to see. But what about helping boost the posts users do want to see?

Through studies and surveys, Facebook found that many users were concerned about missing important updates from friends they cared about the most. In response to these concerns, the social media platform began changing the News Feed algorithm to give more control to the users themselves.

It startedin April 2015, when the company began giving priority (in the form of higher relevancy scores) to posts from friends over the Pages they follow and promotional posts. Later that year, in July, Facebookintroduced the "See First" feature, which lets you actually hand-pick which accounts — whether friends or followed Pages — you want to see first at the top of your News Feed.

Now, when you want to prioritize a person or page to "see first," their posts will appear at the top of your News Feed. To prioritize the people or pages you want to "see first": click thedownward-facing arrowin the top-right corner of any Facebook page and select设置.

In the window that appears, scroll until you findNews Feed Preferencesand select it.

Next, selectPrioritize who to see first.

Finally, select up to 30 of your Facebook friends to add as favorites. You'll now see posts from these individuals first.

花在帖子上的时间

Facebook started monitoring how much time users spend viewing certain posts. Of course, the time you spend on a post can vary depending on your internet speed, the length of the post, and so on — and the folks at Facebook are aware of that.

However, the platform's strategists found thatdwell time, the act of spending a lot more time on a particular post in their feed compared to the majority of other posts they look at, is a good sign that the content was relevant to them.

How does this play out in the feed? If you spend more time on a particular post,Facebook is more likely在您的朋友的新闻提要上显示该帖子。bob官网官方网站

视频参与

在2015年夏季，Facebook调查了用户如何在新闻源上与视频互动，并发现许多对给定视频感兴趣的人不一定喜欢它，对其发表评论或与朋友分享。bob官网官方网站由于参与是Facebook对帖子的兴趣的主要方式之一，因此必须提出其他方法来弄清楚人们是否喜欢他们看到的视频。

要做到这一点,公司开始监视其他fbob全站apporms of video engagement — like turning on the audio, switching to full-screen mode, or enabling high definition. So if you turn up the volume on a video or make it full-screen, the algorithm will interpret that as you enjoying the video, and will show you similar videos higher up in your feed.

The update doesn't mean users will see more videos in their News Feed — only those who already engage more with video-related content.

Facebook的算法非常非常复杂，但我们希望您能为您认为重要的内容一个很好的了解，以便您可以调整您的Facebook marketing相应地策略。现在，让我们继续进行Twitter。

Twitter's Timeline Algorithm

尽管Facebook对您的Facebook新闻源中会显示的内容做出了大多数决定，但Twitter历史上采取了一种非常不同的方法，即“时间表”。bob官网官方网站

Your Timeline is the stream of tweets from the users you follow that shows up on your account home page when you first log in. It used to be that your Timeline was made up of every single tweet from every user you follow, in chronological order. But the folks at Twitter found that similar to what was happening on Facebook, users felt they were missing all the best tweets from the people they care about most.

The changes made to the Twitter algorithm aren't nearly as platform-changing as the ones Facebook has made, but they are somewhat of a departure from the real-time element that has defined Twitter since the beginning.

How It Works

The engineers at Twitter have attempted two different approaches for surfacing the "best" tweets first on your Timeline: the "While You Were Away" feature and the even newer "Show me the best Tweets first" feature.

The "While You Were Away" Feature

This feature was added as an attempt to rid users of whatever FOMO (fear of missing out) they might have been feeling from the chronological nature of the original Timeline.

Basically, it's a recap of some of the best tweets you may not have seen otherwise. How do these tweets make the cut? It's determined by "user engagement".

You can't turn off the feature, but how often you see it depends on how often you use Twitter. The recaps pop up more frequently for users who check the app less often.

The "Show Me the Best Tweets First" Feature

The "Show me the best Tweets first" feature is a little more similar to Facebook's News Feed. Why? Because it actually changes the content on your Timeline based on a tweet's relevancy, rather than listing tweets chronologically.

默认情况下，Twitter的算法放置了它认为您在时间轴顶部最有趣的推文，这些帖子仍然是最新的，并且按时间顺序排列。这些推文是根据您与大多数互动的帐户，与您互动的推文相互作的，等等的。

The "Best Tweets" Feature

The rest of the tweets will be displayed right underneath, also in reverse chronological order. Unlike the "While you were away" feature, these "best tweets" won't be highlighted or indicated in any way — so you won't be able to tell where the "best tweets" stop and the rest of the tweets begin.

有两种方法可以去除这些“最佳微博”from the top of your Timeline. One is a quick fix: You can always refresh your Timeline to see all new tweets at the top in the live way you might have been used to seeing in the past.

But if you want to always see your Timeline live, then Twitter does allow you to opt out of this feature if you'd like — unlike Facebook's News Feed.

To opt out of this feature: Tap the three-star icon in the top right corner of your screen. Then tap Switch to the latest Tweets.

Is Twitter Moving Away From a Real-Time Timeline?

There's no reason to believe so — at least not right now. One of the three sections of your Twitter timeline is composed of tweets displayed in reverse-chronological order. After you scroll through the "While you were away" Tweets and "Best Tweets" you'll be left with the tweets from your followers starting with the most recent.

What might be an emerging trend on Twitter is the opportunity tosubscribe to people's tweets. While this feature wouldn't disrupt the timeline's mostly reverse-chronological order, it could add just one more section to your feed that you'll need to scroll through before seeing the latest updates from your followers.

Twitter isn't the only social media platform iterating its algorithm to show the most interesting content first — Instagram's algorithm is giving Facebook and Twitter a run for their money.

The Instagram Feed's Algorithm

As of January 2021, Instagram has more than1.2 million active userson the platform making it ahotspot for marketersin nearly any industry. However, it's a newer platform compared to the other two on this list, so many of us marketers are still trying to figure it out. The best place to start is from the bottom up — with the algorithm.

Instagram's algorithm has evolved since 2016 when it first began sorting users' news feeds in order of relevance rather than recency. Now, the algorithm works similarly to its parent company's — Facebook. Using machine learning to aggregate six factors, Instagram can determine what content you'll appreciate the most and influence your news feed to prioritize that content.

These six factors shared byTechCrunchare:

• Interest:这是Instagram对您对特定帖子的兴趣的预测。
• 频率：How often you use the app that will determine what posts you see first when you open the app again.
• Following:The more people you follow, the less likely you'll be able to see everyone in your news feed.
• Recency:How recently was a post published? This impacts when you'll see a post in your news feed.
• 关系：Who shared the post and your connection to them will be a significant factor in how often you'll see their content. This is influenced by tagged photos, engagement, and even how often you direct message them.
• Usage:The time you spend on Instagram affects the content you see as well.

What about the Reels, Shop, and Explore pages?

随着卷轴，商店和Explore页面的出现，Instagram用户有几个机会自然地影响上述因素，通过与新闻提要之外的内容互动。bob官网官方网站例如，如果您喜欢烹饪视频，您可能会在新闻提要中看到更多此类视频和卷轴。bob官网官方网站

Is Instagram removing likes?

We'd be remiss if we didn't mention one of the more controversial Instagram algorithm updates — removing likes. Removing one of the most popular features of the app was initially tested as a measure against bullying and increased pressure to post content that garners more and more social approval for young Instagrammers.

The change began in several countries including Canada, Brazil, and Australia. Ultimately, Instagram decided against removing like counts for all users, and insteadgave users the optionto hide public like counts on their own posts, and the ability to apply this change to all posts in their feed under account settings.

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Other Key Algorithms

In addition to updates in the main feed, it’s important to note that each main area of a social media platform has its own algorithm. That means the content that gets shown to you on your Instagram feed is operating on a different algorithm than the Instagram stories that are shown to you.

The biggest differences are between how users are shown photo and video content, respectively. Let’s discuss some of the other key algorithms that impact what content users see and when.

Inappropriate Language

Social media platforms are constantly on the lookout for ways to keep users safe, especially younger users. Platforms may scan content for certain words or subject matter that may be deemed inappropriate, which could lead to that content being deprioritized in the feed.

Copyrighted Content

您是否曾经尝试过将受版权保护的音乐或视频剪辑添加到一段内容中？很有可能会迅速标记并删除，或者可能具有较低的覆盖范围。这是因为社交媒体平台所承担的许可协议中通常不包含版权内容，可能是责任，并且可能对负责分销的用户和平台构成法律后果。

It’s best to avoid including copyrighted elements you don’t have the rights to and follow the特定平台的指南等适当的方式将元素as music in your content.

Cross-Platform Content

虽然重新利用内容是营销人员和创作者中普遍的最佳实践，但这样做可能会对内容覆盖范围产生影响。>>

In early 2021, Instagram announced the algorithm will prioritize recommendingReels that do not have visible TikTok logos, in an effort to discourage users from cross-posting TikTok content to Instagram. That means if a user downloads a video they have created on TikTok and shares the same video with the TikTok watermark to Instagram, the Instagram algorithm will potentially show that content to fewer people.

For maximum engagement potential, Instagram’s@creators accountencourages users to create fresh content for Instagram instead of cross-posting content from other platforms (particularly TikTok). To get around this, some users take to third-party websites to download their TikTok without watermarks and post to Instagram.

It's All About Content Quality

The key takeaway for brands and individuals alike is this: Quality is Queen.

这些算法旨在滤除无关紧要和质量较差的帖子，从而使最高质量的内容通过。控制用户看到和看不到的内容是社交平台与用户之间的协作。用户与他们发现有趣的东西进行交互，社交媒体平台会注意到您下次打开应用程序时向您展示更多内容。

The big lesson for Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram marketers like us is to remember that it's our job to post content to social that's interesting, entertaining, helpful, and/or relevant to our audiences. This means picking relevant topics, writing delightful copy, and posting compelling images and videos.

By following these best practices, your posts will have a better chance of getting shown to users — so you can continue to inspire, delight, and educate them.

Editor's note: This post was originally published in April 2016 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.