The algorithm is not what you think. You are not being tested for how good your post is by how many people from those of whom the post was sent to loved it.

Even if 100 percent of your followers positively reacted to your post, the algorithm will still do nothing about it just because the number of people who reacted to your post is still too low.

The algorithm is not trying to determine whether or not your post is good. The algorithm is trying to determine whether or not it is safe for them to send such post to other people.

The algorithm doesn’t care about the quality of your posts. It just doesn’t want people to get bored prematurely by showing them high quality posts with low engagement.

Think of it like breaking news. You are on the platform to catch up on what is going on in the world to feel less alone or isolated. They tell you what’s happening in the world.

Now the Twitter slogan is starting to make sense. Clearly an epic conversation that took place between two random people on the street is not breaking news.

How do they determine that? Engagement! If something is getting massive or insane engagement, it’s the center of attention at the moment. It’s what people decided deserves the spot light.

I know some people don’t care about what Gary Vaynerchuck has to say. The guy is boring as fuck and is clearly a snake oil salesman. But you have to check him out because this is where the attention is right now. You check out Gary Vaynerchuck because his posts are breaking news. This is what people didn’t hate at the moment. Do something similar. This is the market. This is not my opinion of Gary, this is what I know goes in the minds of the majority of the people who visit his comments section daily to say shit like I needed this today. Even Gary doesn’t respond to all comments not because he doesn’t have time, but because he’s not interested in fake or induced love. Or shall I say, he can’t stand fake news.

The bottom line is this: You are not being tested or evaluated by the algorithm through determining the percentage of the people who engaged heavily with your posts. Even if one hundred percent of the people exposed to your post reacted positively to it, the algorithm will still say meh, we’re not gonna show your post to other people. We’re going to hit the breaks on your post just because the amount (like in kilogrammes) of engagement it got still did not cross the threshold below which we don’t care about or touch your post, and above which, the algorithm will start making its moves.

The algorithm will not push your post any further, aside from what reach hashtags might give you, unless your post hits a certain level of engagement per unit time.

That is why even if the entirety of that engagement came from outside the home feed of your followers or those who are not following you yet, and also not from the explore, …etc. It would still make your post rank high in the algorithm, even though the algorithm never did technically test it on people by showing it to a random sample after the other. For example, if all the engagement came from sharing your post in your story, or just told people to go engage with your latest post through a live stream you did on YouTube, or through a tweet without a link to your post.