The Flaws With EdgeRank Checker's HootSuite Study
I've received a few emails and noticed some posts today about this report of an EdgeRank Checker study claiming that using a third-party API like that of HootSuite to update Facebook decreases engagement per fan. The study claims that Facebook status updates posted with HootSuite, Seesmic, Tweetdeck and other social media management clients are punished by Facebook's EdgeRank.
There's some logic behind the study results. Facebook wants pageviews and uniques. Of course they're going to do everything they can to encourage use of Facebook.com, m.facebook.com and the Facebook mobile app instead of third-party apps.
But the conclusions reached from the survey are flawed. Companies and organizations don't fail to engage audiences on Facebook because of a third-party API. Generally, they fail to engage Facebook audiences because they don't follow Facebook best practices, they don't have a social media plan or they don't have a workflow set up to maximize engagement.
Here's where the conclusions taken from the study results are incorrect or suspect:
"It’s difficult to create unique engaging content several hours or days in advance." The report doesn't include any facts to back up this assumption, which is too general to be passed off as truth. Through good planning and communication, you can schedule timely, engaging content to post several hours or days in advance. Do everything you can to stay in touch with your production managers, salespeople and those responsible for distribution at your company so you can know when products or deals interesting to your Facebook audience are set to launch. Schedule status updates based on those launch dates. But be sure to check in one more time with your staff just before the status update posts to make sure the launch date has not been delayed.
"Automated content typically performs horrendously, due to lacking human touch and craftsmanship." Unlike content from an RSS feed, not all content posted through a third-party application like HootSuite is generated automatically. HootSuite allows you to manually write the text for a Facebook status update and schedule it to post in the future. Perhaps the study would be better to state that RSS content typically performs horrendously.
"Facebook Collapses 3rd Party API Updates." This statement is at best incomplete. According to Facebook, 3rd party API updates are only collapsed if they appear to be from automated feeds. This helps reduce spam. If you manually write and schedule HootSuite posts - in other words, if you make sure your posts don't look like spam - chances are, they won't be collapsed.
"In our opinion, HootSuite is to be used in moderation and not in all situations. Scheduled updates work great when there is no possible way for you to update the account on time. It’s better to have a scheduled post go out, then no post at all." While this is a good recommendation, it also calls into question the entirety of the study, which was reportedly run on "1,000,000+ Updates on 50,000+ Pages." How many of those pages were run by companies and organizations that have the staff necessary to update Facebook manually? The blog doesn't say. In reality, most of those companies may not have the resources to manually create content that leads to engagement. They may not have hired a social media strategist or an online community specialist who can maximize the value of their Facebook presence. Their EdgeRank may be suffering not because they use HootSuite, but because they don't have an employee who knows how to maximize their EdgeRank.