'EdgeRank' key to Facebook visibility

It's official: Real estate brokers and agents trying to connect with consumers on Facebook raise their profiles when they create content that's shared, commented on, or "like" tagged by other users they interact with often.

While it's obvious that Facebook posts with viral appeal will have higher visibility, Facebook engineers have revealed that compelling content generates a higher "EdgeRank," increasing the likelihood that a post will show up in the news feed of a user's friends.

Unlike Google's mysterious search-engine algorithms, the EdgeRank formula is now a matter of public record, after Facebook engineers Ruchi Sanghvi and Ari Steinberg explained its inner workings at a recent developer conference.

Writing about the presentation for TechCrunch, Jason Kincaid notes that comments are likely to be more important than "like" tags, and that comments from users you have frequent interactions with -- as measured by "affinity score" -- are more valuable still.

Roost CEO Alex Chang, writing about EdgeRank on his ActiveRain blog, says that if Realtors are serious about online marketing, they need to get their mind around the concept quickly.

"It's more important than SEO (search-engine optimization) and will make or break you on the most important place on the web: Facebook," Chang said.

Facebook was the most visited website in the U.S. during the week ending March 13, surpassing Google for an entire week for the first time, according to online metrics firm Hitwise.

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