Facebook recently announced a new “Insights” feature for Fan Pages which allows administrators to view how many fans are “talking” on the Page.
The screenshot (left) is from Coca Cola’s Facebook page (yesterday we released a Coca-Cola Facebook case study blog). This “who’s talking about this” metrics display gives Facebook Page admins a good idea of how many people from their total number of fans are interacting on the Page. The display isn’t like the fan activity metrics which are emailed to Page admins, as they are visible to everyone.
However, does this new display offer any value or is it simply another Facebook Page novelty? It does give admins a sky view of how the Page is doing in general, which is a good bellwether to tune into for signs the Page has hit a new low or high and then try to determine causality–but outside of using this publicly visible metric as a general trend indicator there isn’t much else it can be used for.
But the new metrics don’t just stop on the home Page. By going into your Page “insights section” (only accessible to admins), Page managers can dig deeper into the “who’s talking” insights to see exactly how much activity each post receives, which is a lot more helpful than just viewing the total numbers from home Page.
But the real worry here isn’t what value the insights intrinsically add, but what they hinder. Publicly visible metrics could discourage new fans from “liking” your page simply because it doesn’t seem active. For admins who have let their Pages go, this is a good reminder that fans will notice now. But there are many admins doing everything they can to encourage activity on the page, but now with one single glance first time fans might determine that being on a Page where there aren’t many fans talking isn’t worth the time. What’s your opinion of the new “who’s talking” insights? (Comment to share).
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