In his latest announcement, Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s CEO, has indicated significant overhaul in the way its news-feed algorithm is going to function, going forward. By providing content that encourages social interactions per se, the flagship social network seeks to place more emphasis on doling out content from friends and family and moving away from public content, i.e., posts from businesses, brands and media outlets.
Prioritizing person-person engagement
In a bid to engage users more actively, Facebook plans to customize users’ news-feed such that they will see more posts from their immediate social groups. Based on significant academic research conducted by the product team at Facebook, the move seeks to adopt a pro-active and communal approach to building strong social networks rather than superficial surface interactions. Prioritizing what your friends and family share is part of an effort by Facebook to help people spend time on the site in what it thinks is a more meaningful way to build stronger bonds.
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Increasing community interaction
In a post he shared on his Facebook page, Zuckerberg wrote, “By making these changes, I expect the time people spend on Facebook and some measures of engagement will go down. But I also expect the time you do spend on Facebook will be more valuable. And if we do the right thing, I believe that will be good for our community and our business over the long term too.”
Yet another aspect that has probably led to this latest update in Facebook’s newsfeed algorithm is to emphasize the idea that Facebook primarily seeks to promote a user’s well-being through genuine social interactions among close-knit circles.
Promote more organic content; diminishing chances of fake news
By tweaking its news feed such that it cuts down on the posts from businesses and media houses, Facebook may see an opportunity to be able to avoid a repeat of the bad press it received during the 2016 US election when it became a breeding ground for “fake news”, helping spread stories that misled millions.
By reducing the number of third parties in the whole equation of social networking, Facebook may seek to restore the “social” part of social media.
So, what could this mean for the advertising community/publishers?
Due to this move, media houses are bracing to times when there would be a possible lull and significant de-emphasis on news material. Businesses may have to rethink their advertising strategies in organizing their content. That technically means less or no traffic to their websites. So that could well signal the end of clickbait. We are in for interesting times!
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What could have led to this overhaul?
This change in the trajectory could have well stemmed from the fact that Facebook, in the past year, has come under severe governmental scrutiny for its role in spreading misinformation and hate speech. Not just that, a couple of former Facebook insiders came out in the open speaking out about social media’s addictive nature and its harmful impact on society. And as a result of all these accusations hurled back and forth, users will soon be more likely to see a post from a friend than a viral video.
The bottom line!
In more ways than one, Facebook is making an attempt at getting back to its basics: connecting people.
