Organic Reach continues to drop. Social@Oglivy measured that organic reach has dropped from 16% in 2012 to 6% in February 2014 for smaller pages- and just 2% for pages with 500K or more fans.In 2015, Facebook has promised that organic reach will shrink even further.So, what’s the value Facebook Fans? Virtually nothing, right? We should all pull our pages from Facebook in protest like Eat24 did with its Facebook Break up letter.Well, Not exactly.Why?First, you need to think about fans differently. It’s not about the free organic reach, and it’s much more about the data.Two of the biggest challenges with good marketing is identifying the right people and finding a way to retarget them so you can build a relationship over time. It is no different than a new friendship. Once you find someone you like, your relationship builds with him or her, with every contactFacebook Fans are most likely customers of yours and they have selected you as a brand that they like. If organic reach never existed, marketers would be thrilled with the ability to target these fans through paid media.It is only because the ‘free lunch’ of organic reach is over that it is hard for brands and agencies to make the adjustment to paying for impressions and conversions.I say get over it. Stop complaining and run ads to reach your best customers. Here are reasons why -

Fans and Fan/Super Fan Look-alikes perform at 230% and 410% better than than all “other targeting groups” in producing downstream conversions including app installs, e-mails, sales, sweepstakes entries, etc.. Other targeting categories included highly defined interest groups, friends of fans, and custom audiences.So, what does that mean in terms of dollars and cents?It means that if fan basses are built correctly, the Fan and Fan Look-alike media is about ¼ to ½ the cost of other targeted media.Or, said another way, a brand with a large fan base can spend 25 to 50 cents on the dollar to get the same results as a brand with a very small fan base.Owned media works. The investment in growing a powerful fan base yields an asset that pays large dividends over time.We recommend to our clients that they allocate a certain percentage of their social toward building fans and followers and measure it less on the value of organic reach and more on the value of paid media. In essence, how much are they saving because on the ongoing investment in this asset.Want more tips and tricks for how to dominate social this year with Data, Creative and Amplification? Download our 2016 Social Media Survival Guide.