Stepping away is sadly not an option for me. I benefit immensely from Facebook groups. I've just travelled to Chiang Mai in Thailand - a place I've never been to - and from day one I had a very busy social and business life - all thanks to facebook groups where I found like minded people and workshops and social events. I also gave a workshop there which attracted 40 people. 40 people I would have never known how to reach as a newbie in town.
So, like you, I'm hoping for a "private" social media 3.0 to emerge, that will allow us still benefit from the above, while keeping our data safe. It's also why I'm excited about the long term vision of the Pillarproject.io which will help us control how much data we make available to Facebook or any other data collectors. It might be a great "middleman" (sometimes middleman are useful :D )
That's the sad thing about this, isn't i? There is some worth and functionality in FB and other social media that once those connections are built, it's hard to let go. Business pages or groups, or however you have it oriented is a little different than personal pages, where lives are essentially exposed. So, obviously, you do what you have to do to earn a living.
And maybe at some point (which I don't if it's now exactly), those contacts of yours migrate to the STEEM blockchain. The longer it takes, the longer FB and others retain control and manage to mine more and more data, the harder it's going to seem.
MIddlemen can be useful. Sometimes they may be necessary. Steemit, in essence is a middleman. Just one that isn't trying to sell your data to whoever wants it, one that doesn't exist for that sole purpose, and hopefully, never will.