Ever scrolled through your Facebook feed and been bombarded with viral videos or branded content? This is about to change, Facebook is about to make the biggest change to their newsfeed ever.
“We’ve gotten feedback from our community that public content – posts from businesses, brands, and media – is crowding out the personal moments that lead us to connect more with each other,” wrote Mr. Zuckerberg.[i]
In an ever-evolving social media world, Zuckerberg is keen to encourage Facebook users to spend more time on the platform and has decided to switch up what content will appear in feeds. Zuckerberg believes making brands and organisations posts less prominent on consumers newsfeeds their experience on the platform will be better and Zuckerberg believes this change will be ‘good for people’s wellbeing’.
On this notion, to encourage Facebook users to interact with each other more directly, in the coming weeks, Zuckerburg’s plans are to promote posts from people you actually know rather than celebrities or brands.[ii] For example, a picture of family over and above viral videos to encourage higher levels of interactions between Facebook users.
The New York Times discusses users becoming more narrow-minded following this change as posts will appear on their newsfeed that aligns with their own thoughts and ideologies[iii] which may potentially lead to ‘bogus news’ spreading more quickly than before.
But what does this mean for brands? Zuckerberg has spoken out about the effect these changes will have on organisations and brands and although he has spoken out saying engagement may be lower, the content that does appear on their feeds will be more meaningful and impactful as it’s more selective.[iv]
Zuckerberg ended his statement saying It’s important to me that
when Max and August grow up that they feel like what their father built was
good for the world,”
[i] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-42657621
[ii] http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/facebook-news-feed-changes-latest-updates-news-user-accounts-a8154941.html
[iii] https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/11/technology/facebook-news-feed.html
[iv] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-12/facebook-ceo-unveils-news-feed-changes-says-engagement-may-fall