Facebook is currently conducting an experiment related to topic-based feeds on its mobile app.
According to Time, Facebook has been testing different topic-based feeds in place of one main News Feed. This approach was started in October when the company started allowing users to see specialized interest feeds on the web.
A number of users and businesses noticed the changes. One of them is Jason Stein, the founder and CEO of social media agency Laundry Service. He stated that, "Facebook is adding customizable interest-based feeds. A newspaper made up of all the world's newspaper."
The feeds would organize stories from individuals and pages into distinctive themes, for example, "travel" and "style." There's no sign that the fundamental News Feed will change in any capacity.
A spokesperson from Facebook said, "People have told us they'd like new options to see and have conversations about more stories on Facebook around specific topics they're interested in, so we are testing feeds for people to view different stories from people and Pages based on topic areas," The Verge reported.
In addition, Mark Zuckerberg's company is trying out a broader rollout of the "Marketplace" or simply known as "Shopping" aspect that it has been "working on for a few months now." In the new tryout, the icon of "Marketplace" replaces the Messenger icon at the bottom of the app, making the "Messenger" icon be placed on top adjacent to the search bar.
The company confirmed the change of design, informing that only a small population can access it in the U.S.
"The experience will continue to evolve as we learn more about what's useful for people and effective for business, we're still in the early stages of testing and will continue to update the experience as we learn more about what works best," stated Facebook's spokesperson.
Another wonderful feature of the "Marketplace" section is its "sale groups" where users may join. They can utilize the search bar to look for items for sale across all pages and groups. If only Facebook could let users search items for sale without liking pages or joining groups, this could give them an advantage over Craigslist, a classified ads site having the same features that Facebook is testing.
