The Online Dominion of Facebook

You may recall a blog we posted back in March this year about Facebook’s impending saturation of the internet, and after recent news, it appears the digital giant is attempting to produce and implement any new feature it can, to stop that point in time from ever arriving. Over the past couple of days, Facebook has announced several new elements for its 1.44 billion monthly active users around the globe.

Firstly, there is the ‘Add a Link’ feature. Essentially, when someone using the Facebook app on their mobile device goes to ‘update their status’; alongside the options to add a photo, tag someone, add an emotion, or a location, users will see a link icon. This icon will enable them to share links directly in the Facebook app, without the need to exit the app, find the link in a search engine, like Google, then re-visit the Facebook app and paste the copied URL link.

It’s currently only available to a small number of US Facebook users, but if the ‘Add a Link’ component soon becomes something these users can’t live without, you can guarantee it will be rolled out to a wider audience. It also seems to be very easy to use, according to an article on Search Engine Watch, which states that, “To use the Add a Link button, users’ type a search term into a box and then can preview a link from a drop-down menu. Results are based on links and websites already popular within the Facebook app,” (Alford, 2015). Further to this, a major consequence is, of course, Facebook eliminating the need for users to exit Facebook to find a URL, copy it, revisit Facebook and paste the link. It can all easily be performed within the Facebook app.

It also ties in very nicely with the next feature Facebook has announced, which it is calling ‘Instant Articles’. Publishers of content want their content to reach as many people online as possible, so it makes sense to ‘fish where the fish are’, so to speak. As TechCrunch recently reported, “Facebook has become the juggernaut of referral traffic, delivering almost 25% of all social clicks in late 2014… Keeping that stat high goads publishers to push their content to Facebook, expend resources to format it as appealingly as possible, and buy ads to amplify its reach,” (Russell, 2015). Instant Articles is a new platform within Facebook which allows publishers to directly post their articles through the platform. It means that these news articles will no longer just be the links to these articles, but they will be published within Facebook. There have already been some major names which have taken up the feature such as National Geographic, Buzzfeed and The New York Times.

However, Instant Articles won’t magically appear within your news feed. First, you must visit the Instant Articles Facebook Page, like it, and then wait for the content rich articles to pop up when you scroll down your news feed.  There have been some shouts of concern around the web though as people are worried that publishers are giving up control of their content. Michael Reckhow, Facebook’s ‘Instant Articles’ Product Manager, however, claims that, “We designed Instant Articles to give publishers control over their stories, brand experience and monetization opportunities. Publishers can sell ads in their articles and keep the revenue, or they can choose to use Facebook’s Audience Network to monetize unsold inventory,” (Reckhow, 2015).

It’s opening up a brand new digital road of online publication for journalism worldwide. With Facebook increasing our reliance on the social media platform as the source of our news and daily interactions, it’s hard to imagine what they’ll come up with next! One thing you can bet on, is a steady flow of increased traffic through the network, which means your Facebook management and advertising efforts are more important than ever before. So get in touch with us here at SponsoredLinX on 1300 859 600, or visit our website, to find out how we can help you take advantage of this unique opportunity.

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