- Facebook is making an effort to compete with rivals like TikTok for users’ attention.
- The platform is dividing its main “home” area into two tabs.
- Facebook seems to want to give users a choice as to whether they want to engage with the new direction.
The platform is dividing its main “home” area into two tabs as of Thursday. In order to effectively compete with rivals like TikTok for users’ time and attention, Facebook is making an effort to show users more engaging, recommended content and to become what cofounder Mark Zuckerberg has referred to as a “discovery engine.”
Users will now see a home tab when they open Facebook (FB), which is intended to assist them in finding new material based on tailored, machine learning-powered recommendations.
The firm is now encouraging users to post to both platforms, and the home tab will also include Facebook Stories and Instagram Reels.
There will be a new “feeds” tab next to the home tab that will show users the most recent postings from friends, groups, and sites they follow instead of any suggested content.
Users can also create a “favorites” feed within the feeds tab to filter the friends, pages, and groups that are most important to them.
According to the firm, adverts would still be shown on both tabs. Additionally, the other tabs that users are accustomed to, such Facebook Watch and Groups, will not change.
The business issued a statement saying, “We recognize you may desire additional alternatives when it comes to selecting and viewing your material.”
“Sometimes you might already know what you’re looking for, like the most recent postings from your groups, or you could just want to find something interesting to read.”
The platform’s new appearance follows last week’s revelation that users will now be able to have up to five profiles under each account on Facebook.
According to Facebook, the feature is meant to make it simpler for users to customize their experience when interacting with particular communities on the platform, such as friends vs. coworkers.
Years ago, it was claimed that Facebook and Instagram were replicating competing platforms’ hottest new features rather than coming up with their own.
Nearly equivalent to TikTok videos are Instagram Reels, which Meta is now working to more deeply integrate with Facebook (in fact, when the feature first launched, many users simply uploaded TikTok videos to Instagram, complete with the rival logo).
The platform improvements also appear to be an effort to emulate TikTok’s success in retaining users by displaying recommended content, while Facebook seems to want to give users a choice as to whether they want to engage with the new direction or stick with the site as it has always been.
TikTok’s aggressive competition is being fought off by Facebook parent firm Meta (FB), which is one of the factors impeding the business’s profit growth.
Investors were stunned by Meta’s uncommon quarterly user growth stopping report in February, whose trend somewhat improved in the first three months of this year.
The business is expected to release financial results for the three months that ended in June next week. It had anticipated total sales of between $28 billion and $30 billion, which would be roughly in line with the performance of the previous year.
The transformation from a social network firm to one focused on a “metaverse” powered by augmented and virtual reality is now underway at Meta. But in order to finance investments into that ambition, it must continue to reap money from its current platforms.
Beginning on Thursday, the new feeds tab will start showing up in the shortcuts bar for select Facebook users. It is anticipated to roll out internationally over the course of the following week.
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