NEW Facebook News Feed: Meet Facebook Times

The NEW Facebook News Feed is all about the visual! Learn everything you need to know as a user and Facebook Page Admin about the news feed redesign.

A new Facebook news feed that reads like a newspaper?

That’s exactly the intention — But it’s all about the visual!

Mark Zuckerberg’s Announcement

One of the first things said on March 7, 2013, was that the intention is for Facebook to behave as a newspaper would – In chronological order with your favorite stories most prominent.  They acknowledge that the Facebook news feed is where most people spend most of their time. Based on their data, the stories most important to us are photos.

A Visual Tour

When first revealed, the new Facebook news feed is richer and more beautiful.  You’ll notice that images are bigger — Both photos and video. Look even more closely, and you can see that you get the story, and also which of your friends are talking about it. So, if you wake up and find that several people are talking about a new video, you will see the video displayed prominently, along with which of your friends are talking about it.  That means you can gauge the “temperature” and credibility of the story, and decide whether or not you want to share it.

Goodbye Clutter

Facebook asked what we liked about our news feed, and what we wanted to see improved.  People really felt that their news feed was cluttered. We talked.  Facebook listened.  They did some Spring cleaning, and… Hello bright, beautiful stories!  Every story (update) has been redesigned to highlight what your friends are sharing.  Again, its about the visual – bright colors, friends forward.

• Attention for your friends that share great stuff.
• Bigger photos displayed for articles shared.
• Helpful maps show when your friends check-in somewhere.

The Facebook staff thinks of the news feed redesign like going from a 20″ regular TV to getting a wide screen.  It’s also about arranging it all so you see what YOU care about most. How to arrange the bigger, bolder photos as WE wish?

Facebook And The NEW Technicolor News Feed

Get ready for choices and new, groovy views! Facebook has arranged your news feed into really convenient segments, or feeds. Above, you can see a screen shot of how your Facebook news feed might appear.  The highlighted area in the upper right corner is the list of feeds you can navigate to see what’s most important to you. Think of it as the things you enjoy in categorized lists that you can look at in greater detail with one click. Your new blue feed list:

• Most Recent
• All Friends
• Photos
• Music
• Following
• Games
• Groups

They’re pretty self explanatory.  For the Facebook news feed photos only – You see the stories featuring photos from your friends.  Simple! A few notes on feeds:  

• Most Recent – Everything as it is posted, in chronological order.
• All Friends – Everyone, not just people Facebook thinks are most important.
• Close Friends – An option to see posts from a specific circle of Facebook friends.
• Following – Includes celebrities, pages, and interest lists.  Your “subscribes.”

The Most Recent feed is suppose to be everything from everyone, supposedly with no filters.  That word is blurry, as Facebook stated there would be no change in the Facebook news feed algorithm. The default feed is the All Friend feed.  It is expected that people will tend to spend the majority of their time here.

You Can Take It With You

How many times have you checked, liked, and shared on Facebook from your mobile phone or iPad?  There are millions just like you.  So it’s really important for Facebook to offer…

Mobile Consistency.

Look at that!  From the desktop or latop, to the iPad, and on to the mobile phone, the view is the same.  So, with the NEW Facebook news feed — Where ever you go, there it is. See that little bubble at the top of the screen?  As you’re liking and sharing, Facebook tells you when new updates are made by your friends so you can simply click to visit your new stories.  🙂 Now that the views are the same from desktop to mobile, people will be able to see and discover more.  Facebook advises that we may hear from old friends we have not heard from in awhile.

Trade Journals

What about the marketing perspective…? It is still yet to be determined how people will react to the new Facebook news feed.  Brand Pages could get lost in the shuffle.  We don’t know. Here’s what we do know… The clicks to Like and Check-in let users amplify your message in an attractive way! Look at the visual layout! So, when someone Likes your page, a nice representation of your business is made to their friends in the news feed.  Graphic designers, are you ready? And, if you’ve claimed your Place Page, when someone checks in on Facebook at your location, the name of your business and a map goes into their friends’ news feeds.  Pretty nifty, eh?

Takeaway here: Your branding matters!

Facebook Times

Yes, the digital newspaper that shows you the stories most important to you, in chronological order.  So far, it’s all about the Facebook user! There are windows of marketing opportunities for Facebook Page Admins.  Expect this change will probably separate the novice from the savvy… Admins are going to need to know the technical aspects of Facebook Page set-up, maintenance, and messaging.  Important things for your to do list:

• Get your logo and Facebook Page Cover looking spiffy.
• Claim your Facebook Places page.
• Take a graphic inventory of your brand.

It’s obvious a graphic content plan will be necessary.  As a Facebook Admin, your job of making your content so deliciously tantalizing that people want to share it is ever more important!  That’s how you’ll organically get your Facebook Page posts into the Friends feeds of users. Here are a few ideas for graphic content:

• Photos of your business in action.
• Videos that represent your brand well.
• Infographics.
• Maps to events.
• QR Codes.
• Graphic How-tos relative to your business purpose.
• Stipple interactive images.

As far as marketing, the only thing we know about new Facebook News Feed ads is that the images will appear bigger. Will you reach 100% of your fans?  Good question! You may want to help your fans learn how they can subscribe to receive your notifications, just in case.  This is also a good safety net as we experience probable glitches during days of transition. An example of how you can post or share the Get Facebook Page Notifications graphic with your Facebook Fans is here. How will it work if you manage multiple Facebook Pages?  Still unclear. Expect to see a future post from me about Facebook Pages and marketing with the New Facebook News Feed once there is more hands-on experience and data to draw from.

The Kliffnotes Feed

Last year, the big announcement was Facebook Timeline.  This year, it’s the NEW Facebook News Feed. Will we hear that some people hate the new Facebook news feed?  Yes.  For change requires adjustment.  But I suspect that once people spend a short amount of time, they will come to like the news feed redesign. Some may be worried about Facebook news feed privacy.  With the new graph search, still fresh off the press, this is understandable.  For you, I’ve prepared How To Safely Prepare For Facebook Graph Search, which covers privacy settings. For now, lets focus on the positive!

• Images and videos are bigger.
• Easier to tell what your friends are talking about.
• Mobile friendly.
• Choices and options – You’re in control!
• New ways to discover cool things on Facebook!!

The New Facebook News Feed is available to some individuals already, and will roll out slowly. Learn about it from Facebook’s perspective. Get on the waiting list to use it yourself.

Your Turn

What questions do you have about the Facebook news feed changes? What are you most excited to see? Please tell me your thoughts about the new Facebook news feed in the comments box below!  🙂

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7. 

   By Veronica Athanasiou on 9th March, 2013

   Thank you for this article Keri. It is very informative and goes beyond that by suggesting how to adjust our Facebook pages. I was just wondering if the Photos only will not include any photos form pages? It seems very little is left for business to get people’s attention. A bit worrying…. We will just have to wait and see. It will favour all the fake accounts with businesses posting from personal profiles. There is no control of that on this side of the world yet. Cheers!

   Reply to Veronica

   • 

     By Keri Jaehnig on 10th March, 2013

     Veronica, Thank you for reading and sharing your thoughts. Yes, it does seem that personal profiles do have the advantage here. Will fake accounts get advantage as well? Not sure about that. But… I have seen Pages get some very good action in the news feed in the past few days. When someone likes a page, a great image pops up to friends of that person in their news feed. Very cool! For those that also offer people to subscribe to them on Facebook, they will have an advantage — Extra opportunities in the regular news feed. Photos: Looks like photos from friends, not pages. BUT, if a person shares your business page’s photo into their stream, it goes in the photos feed. The moral of the story for the Business Page on Facebook: Create compelling content! 🙂 Hope that helps, Veronica. Always a pleasure to see your smile!! ~Keri

     Reply to Keri

8. 

   By Ralf Skirr on 8th March, 2013

   Wow, that’s an excellent post – the most complete info on Facebook’s new design I’ve seen today, and I have checked many! Especially considering the added info for businesses. I’m still trying to figure out some details. 🙂 A few questions for further exploration: 1. Are you sure the default feed is the friend feed? From what I read before, I thought the ‘tradtional’ newsfeed would remain default, and the 7 new categories are added options. 2. Do you know if the ‘Following’ feed will be unfiltered? That would be good for brands, although it remains to be seen, whether people will use it at all. I thought all the new feeds are unfiltered (within their category) and only the combined newsfeed would be ‘edgeranked’. But I couldn’t confirm that so far.

   Reply to Ralf

   • 

     By Keri Jaehnig on 8th March, 2013

     Ralf, Thank you for reading, and for asking such insightful questions! I listened to the Livestream as the announcement was happening. I also “stayed after” to watch the live blogging and get any feedback from those that were able to ask questions to Facebook staff afterwards. They’ve left some blurry lines for sure. Let me say these things: 1) There was specific mention on the live blog about the default feed being the “All Friend” feed. Discussion on how brands will get exposure, because there is a belief that people will stay in the “All Friend” feed most of the time. So, I do believe this to be correct. If you are able to clarify otherwise, please do share. 2) The Following Feed – This is the tricky one. Facebook staff did say that it would be unfiltered. And then they said there would be no change to the algorithm. Currently, the algorithm is not as friendly as the unfiltered approach. So, I’m holding off to conclude and keeping my eyes and ears open. I’m making “just in case” moves to be prepared and proactive. The specific feeds are suppose to be unfiltered, yes. But we’ve not seen this yet for brand pages. It will be fabulous to finally get the New Facebook News Feed and take all of these new toys for a spin! Lets see what happens… Thanks for sharing your thoughts and curiosities, Ralf, ~Keri

     Reply to Keri

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