Increase the Number of Replies to Your Facebook Posts

Reactions in the form of shares, likes, and comments

Having people remark on your Facebook posts is the holy grail of engagement. While a high number of likes and shares might provide credibility to your business, it is comments that show true engagement from your audience.

A reader who bothers to leave a comment likely finds what you've written to be of great interest. Therefore, Facebook is more likely to include your material in the News Feed if it determines that it leads to conversations and significant relationships among people.

Director of Facebook's News Feed Adam Moressi said in a blog post in January 2018 that the social media platform will prioritize "posts that generate back-and-forth discussion in the comments and posts that you may want to share and reply to."

Facebook advises against asking for comments, yet you want them. Moressi remarked, "We will continue to demote these things in News Feed since using 'engagement bait' to entice people to comment on stories is not a meaningful interaction."

So, how can you obtain more genuine comments on Facebook without using bait? Here are some guidelines to keep in mind:

Solicit genuine opinions from your audience. No action will be taken against any post that sincerely seeks feedback in the form of advice, ideas, or recommendations. It is OK to solicit feedback from customers on the optimal use of your products as well as suggestions for improving them.

Make good use of images. A post with just text won't garner many reactions unless it's complemented with an interesting story or tackles a contentious issue. The social media monitoring service NewsWhip found that videos make up 86% of the most commented-on Facebook posts, while photographs make up 14%.

Make inquiries. Socialstore.io found that although asking a question in a Facebook post is a great way to increase interaction and discussion among your followers, some types of questions perform better than others. According to data collected by Socialstore.io, posts including the phrases "should," "would," "which," and "who" attract the most comments, while those containing the terms "why" and "how" receive the fewest.

Communicate interesting material that will stimulate debate. According to data compiled by NewsWhip, the greatest discussion occurs around posts that are controversial, related to trending news stories, or cover a familiar topic. Although many businesses would rather not post on politics on their social media channels, they often have something to say about local sports teams and other happenings.

Raise the stakes and get a strong response. Sharing a message on social media may quickly become viral, and in almost every case, it will cause a strong emotional reaction in the reader. Aim to surprise, amuse, or infuriate your readers in order to elicit a stronger response from them.

Put up a photo and ask your followers to come up with a caption. Pick an interesting or funny photo and have a contest to see who can come up with the best caption.

Try your hand at a business-related fill-in-the-blank post. Users of fill-in-the-blank posts are asked to provide the missing word(s) or phrase(s). This not only encourages people to respond in order to "fill the gap" with a remark, but it also may give you with valuable audience information.