Facebook Launches Homepage And Downgrades Pages "Temporarily" Shifts Page Communication Channels

When Facebook announced that they would launch a revamped homepage and upgrade the Facebook Pages product this week, many took it as a sign that Facebook was looking to make the platform more welcoming to businesses and brands. That's partially how Facebook pitched the concept last week during their press conference. Today, the homepage began rolling out and one of the first things I noticed was that there is no longer a link to the "Updates" area of the inbox. What is the "Updates" area exactly? Well, it's the space where users can view messages sent from the Pages that they have become fans of. Yes, page activity will now be displayed within their fan's feeds but it makes me wonder how the decision was made to roll out Pages today. Was it just to make their deadline set via a press conference last week? Perhaps the decision was made because they knew that Google was going to launch their interests based advertising today and they needed something to counter the announcement. Whatever the reason was, there's something which is just a little bit strange about the decision to go live today. In a normal business, the customers would be considered when a change is made. When I spoke with Peter Deng today to discuss the upgrades he clarified a few confusions of mine. The primary clarification being why on earth Facebook decided to eliminate Page update notifications from the homepage. All he could say is that they "will add enhancements" to the homepage in the near future. Let's be honest, this is an extremely small flaw and not everybody has access to the new homepage yet. Most Facebook Page owners probably haven't even noticed this minor adjustment yet, but that's not what matters. It doesn't send the right signal to businesses when their primary method of contacting customers is cut off (or impeded), even if it is temporary. I continue to be a huge supporter of Facebook and I am actively developing new products that will emphasize my continued commitment. As one of the company's biggest followers, I find myself somewhat frustrated when a decision is made to sacrifice value for businesses in exchange for new features and new channels. It just doesn't make business sense. I personally believe that Facebook Pages presents a huge opportunity for businesses. That's why I took the time to write the Facebook Page strategy which I published this morning. The lack of access to Page updates is small but it makes me feel like I'm leading businesses blindly and that doesn't make for a good business. Update See my recent post about Facebook as status for clarification on this.

Social Pro Daily

Facebook Launches Homepage And Downgrades Pages "Temporarily" Shifts Page Communication Channels

Nick O'Neill

About

Subscriptions

Events

Publications

WORK SMARTER - LEARN, GROW AND BE INSPIRED.

Subscribe today!

Nick O'Neill