Are you sick of scrolling through what you believe to be worthless fluff in your Facebook news feed? Well, you’re in luck. In an announcement earlier this month, Facebook explained it is working on delivering more high-quality content to its users’ news feeds. In the past, Facebook algorithms determined what status updates, links, or photos were showing up in a user’s news feed based on the level of a post’s engagement. This meant that if a business posted a photo or update that received a large amount of likes, comments, and shares, more of its Fans would see it. However, Facebook will now be taking the quality of the content into consideration, as well.
So, what determines whether a Page’s content is considered ‘high’ or ‘low’ quality? Well, according to ABC News, in an effort to define ‘high quality’, Facebook surveyed thousands of users and found they preferred seeing articles about current events, celebrities, and sports in their news feed, versus memes, photos, and graphics.
Lars Backstrom, Facebook’s News Feed Manager, also explained that in order to determine a post’s weight, Facebook will be looking at thousands of other factors including the quality of the source’s other content and the amount of clicks the post receives from mobile phones.
This is great news for businesses and organizations that use Facebook to help publish and promote unique content found within their website or blog. And it’s not surprising that Facebook is targeting mobile consumers with this change. Facebook mobile users are up 54 percent from last year.
Facebook has also added an “additional articles” feature that displays a number of related articles underneath an article a user has clicked. The articles are chosen based on a user’s search history, other clicks, and interests he or she has listed within his or her Facebook profile.
“After you click on a link to an article, you may see up to three related articles directly below the news feed post to help you discover content you may find interesting,” Facebook explained.
This new feature is similar to Twitter’s “related headlines” feature that was released this summer.
Facebook will also apply “story bumping” to brands’ statuses that are receiving a large number of comments. This means that when a post receives an additional comment, it will resurface at the top of the news feed to create more conversation – even if it was posted a few weeks prior.
The changes to Facebook’s news feed algorithm will be seen on both users’ desktop computers and mobile devices. However, the increase in articles will be more visible within Facebook’s mobile app.
Sources:
http://browsetechnology.com/facebook-updates-news-feed-to-focus-on-more-quality-content/
http://topnews.net.nz/content/231357-high-quality-content-show-more-prominently-facebook-news-feed
