Is this post your type?
You can use a few different Facebook post types for your business, including photos, link posts, Reels and Stories.
If you’re a brand looking to reach new customers online, Facebook is a great choice. It’s a platform with exciting ways to keep content fresh, repurpose existing content, and build a real sense of community.
Let’s break down some of the most popular Facebook post types to see you through 2024.
TL;DR: What to know now
Photo posts
Whether it’s a product, an eye-catching photo, or maybe even user-generated content, photo posts are a great way to go on Facebook. This is especially true if you are a product-focused business looking to win new customers.
Ensure you’re keeping your branding consistent, following the recommended image size guidelines, and crediting people if you repost other people’s photos.
You can also include URLs in your caption, directing people to a website to find out more information.
Link posts
A link post is a post that includes an external link to a website. While the preview link primarily takes up the post, you can still include a catchy caption.
Copy and paste the URL into your Create Post box to make a link post. From there, Facebook will automatically generate a preview of the website. Once the preview has popped up, you can delete the URL from the caption, and the link preview will remain.
Link posts are a fantastic way to promote your website content or spotlight other content you think your followers might enjoy or benefit from.
Facebook Reels (short-form videos)
Like Instagram, Facebook supports Reels or short-form videos. But unlike traditional videos on Facebook, Reels are more discoverable and can pop up in other places on the platform, like on the Explore page and Reels tab, as well as your news feed.
For Facebook to consider a video a Reel, it has to be between 3 and 60 seconds long, portrait size (in the aspect ratio 9:16) and a mp4 file.
Like Instagram, music, effects, and voiceovers can be added to Facebook Reels. When posting a Reel to Instagram, you can just select the option to post it to Facebook.
Reels are ideal for those who use Facebook on their phones (which is most people these days) since the portrait format is optimised for our phones. Reels are also great for quickly capturing a user’s attention as they are usually only 10-15 seconds long.
Video posts (long-form videos)
If you have a video in a landscape ratio (16:9) or longer than 60 seconds, Facebook will post it as a video, which will show up on the news feed (rather than your Explore page).
Facebook videos can be as long as four hours (or 240 minutes) and up to 10GB in size.
These long-form videos are great for storytelling and product tutorials.
Facebook Stories
Facebook Stories are the same as Instagram Stories, which expire after 24 hours.
Facebook Stories work best in a 9:16 aspect ratio, so shooting content verticality is a good idea. While Facebook Stories are limited to 20-second clips, nothing stops you from cutting videos into 20-second segments and uploading them sequentially.
Pinned posts
As the name suggests, a pinned post is any Facebook you decide to pin to the top of your page. This means that your pinned post will be the first post they see regardless of how someone makes their way to your Facebook page.
A great time to use a pinned post is when you have either a particularly well-performing post or a post highlighting some critical information your followers need.
Alternatively, you could use pinned posts to promote sales, new products, or even some FAQs you’d like new followers to see when they first land on your Facebook page.
Remember: you can change your pinned post whenever you want; however, you can only have one at a time.
Text posts
Also known as status updates, text-based posts were the cornerstone of Facebook’s heyday. Nowadays, businesses do not commonly use text posts; you only need to utilise them in a few specific instances.
While a text post isn’t a great choice if you aim to drive traffic to your website or increase your sales, it can work if you’d like to ask your followers a question or share information quickly (such as sudden changes in business hours or limited edition tickets for sale). While photos are a great way to capture attention, you might not have the time or means to access a suitable photo for the occasion, in which case a text post works.
Facebook Live
The Facebook Live feature lets you live stream a video to the platform. While you are live streaming, users can hop on, react, and comment, so it’s an excellent way to increase engagement and reach your followers organically.
To use this feature, go to your Facebook profile. Then scroll down to the “what’s on your mind” box and click the “live video” button.
After your live stream, you can turn these videos into Facebook Reels so they can stay on your profile and not disappear.
It’s essential to be prepared before you go live. Have a game plan in place, such as notes on what you will talk about or a plan of what you want to film.
A Facebook Audit offers valuable insights into whether or not your content is connecting with your followers.
