Facebook changes are coming – what it means for you, and for Starts at 60

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg made it very clear that Facebook will be changing its news feed over coming months to remove ‘news’ from your wall. You can see our story explaining the changes here.

Despite our enormous volumes of community conversation, we don’t want to expect the way Facebook chooses to show posts to users to differentiate for Starts at 60, so we’re taking action, and ask you to too. We ask you to take these five steps to keep Starts at 60 coming to you, off Facebook and on.  

We expect to have to move our primary communications with you to your inbox and to our homepages at Starts at 60 and Travel at 60.  Both sites are super-mobile friendly so you can set up a bookmark for them on your devices.  

As a media operation here to serve you, it is frustrating that Facebook’s made these changes, but change is part of the new world of media so we must adapt, together and fast. We know it is very convenient for you to receive your content via Facebook but if you haven’t noticed already, you surely will now notice soon that we have been appearing on your walls less and less.  

We’ll still be on Facebook but they will be placing priority on things that engage communities in discussion, so this requires any legitimate communities like Starts at 60’s, full of people who pride ourselves on conversation, to up the volume. We need you to talk on our stories even more!

To do this, and ensure we reach the right people with the right conversations, we are adapting into Facebook ‘groups’, rather than ‘pages’, as Facebook says it will reduce the number of people reached by of any media-style publishing from Facebook Pages of media companies and businesses.

And if you no longer receive news media via Facebook and would like to continue that in some form, it is likely you’ll have to look for it elsewhere, and we want you to know where to look.  

To help us reach you in the next phase we ask you to do all of the following things:

• Sign up for Starts at 60 on our website. This is the most important action we have for you. As we evolve here, it will ensure we can bring you with us. Starts at 60 is now sending two action-packed emailers a day, one around lunchtime and one in the evening Australia time, that bring you the most popular of our stories.

• Visit the Starts at 60 page on Facebook and look for the setting ‘See First’ which is where you can select Starts at 60, to ensure you will see our latest and hottest content on your newsfeed when you come for a look.
• Join one or many of our NEW Starts at 60 Clubs and Groups on Facebook. These will be prioritised in your news feeds by Facebook and are proving fantastic communities! We’ll be publishing into these, but more importantly, we’ve been building communities in each that are becoming exciting, engaging and really powerful places to be, and all centre around your specific interests so you won’t miss anything.  

News Junkies Club – Australia  https://facebook.com/groups/startsat60newsjunkiesAU/

News Junkies Club – USA https://facebook.com/groups/startsat60newsjunkiesUSA/

Travel lovers Club https://www.facebook.com/groups/travelat60travelloversAU/

Sassy Sixties Club  (it’s all light stories and fun in here) https://www.facebook.com/groups/startsat60sassysixties/

Grandparents Club https://facebook.com/groups/startsat60grandparents/

Nostalgia Club https://facebook.com/groups/startsat60nostalgiaclub/

Health Club https://facebook.com/groups/startsat60healthclub/

Food-Lovers Club https://facebook.com/groups/startsat60foodlovers/

Money Club https://facebook.com/groups/startsat60moneyclub/

Carers Club https://facebook.com/groups/startsat60carers/

Book Club https://www.facebook.com/groups/startsat60bookclub/

Crafters Club https://www.facebook.com/groups/startsat60craftersclub/

Gardeners Club https://www.facebook.com/groups/startsat60gardenersclub/

Man Cave https://facebook.com/groups/startsat60mancave/

Older Entrepreneur https://www.facebook.com/groups/olderentrepreneur/

• Visit our websites or even better, bookmark them on your phone, tablet and computer (we recently relaunched them so they are truly beautiful) Startsat60.com and Travelat60.com.  There are new stories going up here every 15-30 minutes all day long, and plenty of opportunity to comment and discuss, just as there is on Facebook. Plus, it allows you to choose what you see, rather than Facebook selecting which of our content it shows you, as is the case on your news feed. And there is always something interesting to read – we publish a far bigger variety of stories than you might realise just from what Facebook chooses to show you!
• Comment on our articles when you do see them on Facebook. We are a conversation-driven community so this should affect us less than other media outlets, but we need you to bear in mind that only content with comments will reach you. That excites and terrifies us at the same time!  So please, join the conversation more.  

We’ve been blessed to have Facebook as a media platform for the last four years, and to grow our community using it.  For it to continue to grow, we need to build our relationship with you off-Facebook from now on, so please, come over to our website and sign up.  

Rebecca XXX