I’ve been experimenting with one of the Facebook pages I run, Things To Do In Oshawa.

Every day, I aggregate what’s going on in the city and post a summary of what’s happening to keep locals informed about local events/activities. Those regularly get a reach of about 600-700. They are just text with links to the event details – nothing fancy. That happens 3 times/day, one in the morning, one in the early afternoon, and one in the evening (that summarizes what happens the next day).

From time to time, I also post a short status about my clients’ products/services so those of the 3% looking for that particular thing will have top-of-mind-awareness (TOMA). Those posts get maybe 200+ reach.

Also, from time to time, I’ll post a funny picture – just a random funny picture, not even from the Oshawa. Although those get liked and shared more often than the event/activity statuses, they usually only get 400-500 reach. Seems Facebook has been bumping up the reach of just plain text posts.

Here’s the interesting part. I’ve been experimenting with posting “True Oshawa Facts”… images from the local area with simple text on them (create using memegenerator.net). These statuses have been getting HUGE likes and shares… and reach. For example, this post (shown on the right), has reached more than 23,000 people (and comments and like are still trickling in weeks later)! Other local “True Oshawa Facts” are regularly getting 2000+ reach.

When people can really relate/resonate with a post, be it text or image, the interaction and reach go way up. If you’re looking to boost the reach of your posts, try something local and something people can identify with. It’s been working great for us.