Meta is looking to reduce the reach of political content - but what does that actually mean?
While Meta is looking to move away from political content in favour of more entertaining and less divisive interactions on its apps, the key question now is what this actually means in practical terms and how Meta is going to determine what is 'political' and what isn't.
Last week, Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri announced that both Instagram and Threads are moving to a new system where political content will become available by default, meaning that if users want to continue to see politics-related posts in their feed, they'll have to go into their settings and specify that.
Toggling political content on Instagram
This switch is not yet available, but Mosseri further noted that both Facebook and IG have been taking steps to reduce the impact of political posts for some time, and now Threads is also going down the same path.
And for social media marketers trying to figure out how to maximise the reach of their political posts, the specific wording here is important.
As Mosseri explained:
"Over the next few weeks, we'll be improving how we avoid recommending content about politics on recommendation boards, both on Instagram and in Threads. If you don't want political recommendations, you'll have the option to opt out. These recommendation updates apply to publicly available accounts and only where we recommend content. They don't change how we show people content from accounts they want to subscribe to."
So, to be clear: you can subscribe to any profiles you want, and Meta's algorithms won't limit showing those users' content in your feed. But if you're not subscribed to a particular profile, and it regularly posts political content, you'll be less likely to accidentally bump into it unless you toggle a specific switch in your preference settings.
It's also important to note that Mosseri specifies "accounts" in his ad, not publications. So if you regularly publish political content, it seems like this would be an account-level restriction. This could mean that even if you only post about politics occasionally, you could still see a reduction in reach as a result.
Coincidentally, just a few days after this announcement, Meta launched an initial test of "Trending Topics" in Threads, which was a highly requested feature.
Popular Topics
Some noted a potential conflict here, as Meta also stated that political content would be allowed to appear on this list. But in fact it's only because of the political restrictions that Threads is even trying out the trending list, because as less political content is displayed to users, it inevitably also means that political topics are much less likely to trend in the same way, as they simply won't get coverage unless users deliberately search for them.
So the two ads actually go hand in hand rather than contradicting each other.
But the key point that marketers now need to understand is what Meta will identify as political content, and how they can avoid limiting their messaging to this new process.
Which Meta hasn't been very candid about).
According to CNN, Meta's current guidance on this is as follows:
"Based on research, our definition of political content is content that is likely to be about topics related to government or elections; for example, posts about laws, elections or social topics. These global issues are complex and dynamic, which means this definition will evolve as we continue to engage with the people and communities who use our platforms and external experts to refine our approach."
Election content makes straightforward sense, but the discussion of law is actually much broader than the political sphere, and probably applies to many brand profiles, particularly legal businesses, which may reduce their reach.
Also, "social topics? What does that even mean? Discussing flood relief is a social topic?
Meta's position is essentially that it doesn't have a clear definition of what will qualify and what won't.
Climate change is a political topic, but it is also a broader social issue. Elon Musk is a political figure of sorts.
Theoretically, but all of these things could have an impact, depending on how the Meta team wants to apply its restrictions, which could make it difficult to maximise reach across its apps for a wide range of brands.
It also contradicts much of what brands have been told in recent years regarding public stance on social.
Back in 2018, a survey by Sprout Social found that 66 percent of consumers believe it's important for brands to take a public stance on major social and political issues, including immigration, human rights and race relations.
Sprout's social policy report
Snapchat's 2022 study paid more attention to younger consumers and found that Generation Z is becoming increasingly loyal to companies that speak out about social issues and share information that promotes social change.
This was the general message that brands need to take a stand and promote it to further endear themselves to their target audience. This makes sense given the broader understanding of social causes in the modern information sphere, but now Meta is trying to push things in a different direction, which could lead to a significant shift in approach across all of its applications.
So why is Meta doing this in the first place? Because that's what users want, and it's backed up by activity data.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg noted back in 2021 that the most common feedback the company receives is that people want fewer divisive political posts to appear in their feed. As a result, Meta has since worked to reduce the presence of news and political content, instead favouring more entertaining short videos, which has yielded a significant increase in engagement.
This is a significant shift, especially when you consider that historically the most effective posts on social apps have been those that elicit a lot of responses, and the content that is most likely to elicit a reaction is the one that evokes an emotional response. This can be joy or happiness, but it also means anger and outrage, which political content certainly handles better than anything else.
Overall, it's good for Meta to move in this direction, but it will require rethinking how you can maximise your efforts in its applications.
It will be interesting to see what the actual impact will be as Meta plans to expand this approach.