Data Analysis: Which Facebook Post Type Rules The News Feed?

Find more updated number on our Facebook study.

Due to the permanent adaptation and optimization of the Facebook news feed and the implementation of over thousand different weights for users, it has become a major challenge for Facebook pages to reach their existing audience. Meanwhile, many pages are reaching only a small fraction of their fans, but of course, the reach of those posts can easily be increased by boosting them as sponsored stories. Basically, the more interactions a post receives, the more fans will see it in their news feed. This raises the question whether one can find out which post types are generating the most interactions. In other words: Is visual content really the holy grail to appear in the news feed of fans?

We created a sample data set of 72,194 Facebook pages. These pages produced a total amount of around 49 million posts between the 1st January 2013 and 31st January 2014. The analyzed posts are divided into the following types: Photo, Link, Status, Video, Cover Photo, Offer, Note, Question, Music, SWF and Event.

Facebook Post Type Distribution: 1/1/2013 - 1/31/2014

Which Facebook Post Type Rules The News Feed?