The average Facebook user has 130 friends, is connected to 80 community pages, groups and events and has access to more than 900 million objects like Pages, groups and events. Facebook is a crowded place. There’s a distraction around every corner.

It’s no longer “new media.” It’s the social media status quo, which means standing out on the 800 million user social network is harder than ever.

Grow with Paid

It’s natural for marketers to want to reach more people, especially as they’re devoting time and resources to the Facebook platform, but the number of Likes a Page receives is deceiving. On average, less than 5% of a Page’s fans see the Page’s content and engage with it.

Investing in paid Facebook is the most effective way to move out of Newsfeed purgatory. Brands can use ads to let their audience know they’re on Facebook with Like ads, and they can use Sponsored Stories to move their content to the top of Newsfeeds to encourage user engagement, which then makes that content more valuable and viewable across more Newsfeeds. This illustrates the importance of growing with quality fans who actually like your brand. A superficial like means nothing because they won’t care what you have to say… ever.

Paid Facebook ads allow brands to grow their fan base and encourage interaction, two key aspects to getting the most out of the platform.

Leverage with Earned

Growing an audience is important, but it’s also important to make the most out of the fans your brand already has. Facebook Insights allows you to see the percentage of fans who actually interact with the brand on Facebook called active fans. Improving this percentage makes your content more valuable, thus more likely to show up in user Newsfeeds because Facebook uses its EdgeRank algorithm to evaluate how content is resonating with users. The more people interacting, the more likely the content is valuable, which means the more likely the content is displayed in Newsfeeds.

Brands should evaluate how their content is encouraging users to take actions, whether that’s through commenting, clicking, Liking and so on. Facebook is a conversation, not a broadcast, platform. What is getting that conversation going most effectively for your brand?

Kick Start Then Maintain

A paid and earned approach to Facebook isn’t an either/or proposition. Both work together. Paid approaches allow brands to grow their fan base and get their content front-and-center, while earned approaches allow brands to maintain that momentum by keeping their audience’s attention over the long-term.