As part of their constant efforts to improve the user experience, Facebook has been testing a new alternative News Feed. The Explore Feed, as it’s known, which is essentially a secondary News Feed, has appeared on the desktop version of Facebook for some users.
The new feed is designed to allow Facebook users to find more content that might interest them and diversify their content sources, both of which will keep them on Facebook for longer at a time.
However, reports are now emerging that suggest the Explore Feed could also be the home for Facebook Page posts going forward.
A tweet by The Next Web’s Matt Navarra shows a different description for the Explore Feed in Slovakia:
Facebook in 2018?
News Feed: Friends + sponsored posts
Explore Feed: Pages+ other posts
Social media managers: pic.twitter.com/KnrRsnXLUx
— Matt Navarra ⭐️ (@MattNavarra) October 21, 2017
As you can see, it looks as though Facebook Page posts could find themselves in the Explore Feed in the future. Reading between the lines, it means the standard News Feed will only contain posts by friends and sponsored posts. It’s a move that will no doubt prove frustrating for social media managers looking to expand their organic reach.
Apparently, Facebook Page posts are appearing in the Explore Feed for users in Slovakia, Sri Lanka, Serbia, Bolivia, Guatemala and Cambodia at present. But who knows if this will be expanded to other countries over time.
Facebook confirmed the tests in a blog post, adding: “People tell us they want an easier way to see posts from friends and family. We are testing having one dedicated space for people to keep up with their friends and family, and another separate space, called Explore, with posts from pages.”
If this tweet by Slovakian journalist Filip Struhárik is anything to go by, Facebook posts by media outlets in the country have already taken a big hit:
Slovak media have 4x less interactions since #Facebook is testing #explorefeed (data by @crowdtangle, 60 biggest FB media pages in Slovakia) pic.twitter.com/UMfEBFz98P
— Filip Struhárik (@filip_struharik) October 20, 2017
While we’ll have to wait and see if the change is rolled back in Slovakia and the other countries or expanded further, the bottom line could be that paid advertising might be more powerful than ever for brands in the future.
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