At the end of June, Facebook announced another change to its newsfeedalgorithm. Score a win for cat videos, a blow to great rateposts.

The gist of the change will result in more newsfeed contentcoming from friends and family and less from pages andpublishers.

Within a day of the announcement I had clients and credit unioncolleagues asking about the change and whether Facebook wasrelevant to their marketing program anymore.

I’m sharing with you, my CU Times readers and friends,my response.

What is Facebook, Really?

I have always believed that Facebook's value and overallobjective isn't rooted in its website and pages per se. Its valueis derived from the connectivity it creates, a social glueconnecting the internet. If we look at major productenhancements and acquisitions, we’ll see this theory supported.

For example, one day back in 2011 “Read" and other verb buttonsstarted showing up on publisher sites. Suddenly everyone in mynetwork could see what I was reading on the WashingtonPost or listening to on Spotify. Naturally, this servestheir purpose of collecting vast, anonymous, insight data on users.But how relevant is all that data to my newsfeed and myfriends?

User Experience Comes First

Recent years have seen Facebook succeed in data collection andincreased relevance in advertising, but it's also slipped on itscore function, connectivity. As a result the newsfeed hasgotten messy and users have grown disloyal.

So while at first glance the move sucks for businesses, itdoesn't entirely and here's why.

Your Credit Union Facebook Page Still Has aPlace

The role of the business page won't go away. However, the focuson high quality content on that page just intensified. Your contentwill still break through assuming you’re posting content that youraudience wants to share, like and comment on. If the content isjunk, the page won't break through. That's a great userexperience. Planning and data driven content will go a longway in helping you achieve break through content.

Great Content Means Great Network

That great user experience lends to a livelier network, for allof us, which supports the primary objective of Facebook, to be aglue. If it's full of junk, no one wants to participate andFacebook can't be successful at its business objective, which iswhere your credit union should really have stakes.

The Growing Power Of Paid SocialAdvertising

The two predominant gobblers of online advertising dollars areFacebook and Google. While it might feel crummy that your creditunion may have to pay to play, the treasure trove of data and toolsthat Facebook continues to roll out should make advertising andgoal-oriented marketing your main objective via the platform.

For example, Facebook recently announced it will be rolling outits audience network (ads that show off Facebook.com to Facebookusers) to non-Facebook users. Facebook is now going head-to-headwith Google and other major display networks, but with even betterad units (opinion) that drive higher engagement and higher ROI.

The only reason they can do this and be successful is becausethey maintain a product that's useful to the consumer user andstill has a relevance to a business user. So yes, the changeis kind of a bummer because now we really have to be good at we doorganically, but it will push overall marketing efforts and evenbetter, results, into new territory.

Your Facebook page, audience and the content you share shouldn’tbe mutually exclusive from your paid tactics, your conversionmetrics and overall objectives. They all work together to createsuccess on the platform, now more than ever.

The Sum of the Change

So while some can grumble about the change to Facebook’salgorithm and decide to boycott, it’s their loss. The pages thatwill struggle will be ones that are inconsistent, post irrelevantcontent, don’t leverage strategic paid tactics, and aren’tengaging.

By engaging I mean doing more than just posting links. Askquestions, respond to comments, create a lively place for yourmembers to talk with you and each other about the things thatmatter to them and their community.

Let your page be a gathering place with your brand at thecenter, and you’ll reap the rewards.

Ryan Ruud is the CEO and founder of The Credit UnionConsulting Group. He can be reached at 612-799-0803or [email protected].