Learn how Facebook decides what appears in your news feed and where it appears in your news feed. This guide takes you through what factors Facebook considers when deciding what appears in your news feed as well as ways to improve where your posts appear.

1. EdgeRank
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2. What is EdgeRank?
• EdgeRank is the algorithm used by Facebook
to determine what appears in each individual
newsfeed and where it appears in each
newsfeed.
• The algorithm is made of three variables:
Affinity (Ue)
Weight (We)
Time Decay (De)
• ΣUeWeDe
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3. Affinity (Ue)
• The affinity score measure the relationship or
connection between two users. The closer the
relationship or connection, the higher the
score.
• E.g. I am friends with my sister on Facebook,
we have 70 mutual friends and I write on her
wall regularly. We have a high affinity score so
Facebook will include her in my newsfeed.
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4. Weight (We)
• Posts are weighted differently:
1. Photos/ videos
2. Links
3. Plain text updates
• Facebook changes the weight according to
what they believe the user will find most
engaging
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5. Time decay (De)
• How old the post is!
• Posts become ‘old news’ over time, the time
decay enables the newsfeed to remain up to
date with recent news
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6. Edgerank Is Dead?
• In mid 2013 Facebook announced that they
would be introducing a completely new algorithm
which now included as many as 100,000 different
elements
• The new algorithm works by bumping stories you
don’t see during a browsing session to the top of
your newsfeed in your next browsing session
• This can be affected by the amount of
engagement (likes, comments and shares) a post
receives
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7. EdgeRank is dead cont.
• Another change to the algorithm is the Last
Actor
• This takes into account your last 50
interactions (likes, comments and shares)
• People who you have engaged with most
recently are given more weight and Facebook
will push their posts higher in the News Feed
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8. EdgeRank is dead cont.
• Post types – The News Feed algorithm also takes into
account the type of post a user tends to interact with
• On June 23rd 2014 Facebook announced a change to
the way videos are ranked. As well as taking into
account likes, comments and shares, Facebook will
now also consider whether someone has watched a
video and for how long they watched it.
• Facebook said this will help them personalise the
newsfeed and people who tend to watch more
videos in the newsfeed could expect to see more
video near the top of the newsfeed
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9. EdgeRank is dead cont.
• Device capabilities – The News Feed algorithm
also takes into consideration the device being
used, e.g. a user with a slow internet
connection is likely to see more text updates
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10. EdgeRank lives on
• Despite Facebook’s new algorithm being said
to now consist of over 100,000 variables the
original EdgeRank variables still remain very
important in the new algorithm
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11. Improving your Page’s rank
• Be precise – posts over 250 characters receive
60% less likes than those between 100 and
250 characters long
• Visuals –
Photo albums receive 180% more engagement
Photos receive 120% more engagement
Videos receive 100% more engagement
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12. Improving your Page’s rank cont.
• Post regularly – 96% of fans won’t return to a
page so regular posts are the only way of
reaching them
• Time – Different audiences will use Facebook at
different times, test different times of day to find
when your audience are most active
• Segmenting – Facebook allows you to target who
will see your updates
Male / Female
Relationship status etc.
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13. Improving your Page’s rank cont.
• Social Call To Action (CTA) – with the new
algorithm taking into account the level of
engagement with a post, it is important for
people to be engaging with your posts
• People often won’t take action unless you tell
them to e.g.
“please share”
“comment below”
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