Facebook publishes a feed story everytime you add a new friend, however in the past it was a simple text update. It would say something to the extent of, “Nick O’Neill is now friends with John Peterson.” Over the weekend the company began adding a new feature which provided slightly more insight: the photos of the people the user was becoming friends with. It’s similar to the upgraded feature I covered last week, in which users’ profile photos are now displayed in notifications.
As I wrote then, user images help increase engagement. While it’s unknown how much of an improvement Facebook sees, there’s no doubt that the company is making the change, knowing that it will result in more clicks, in turn keeping users on the site for a longer period of time. While it’s not the biggest update in the world, it’s definitely a noticeable one as each of my friends’ new connections are catching my attention as they show up in the feed.
Is it really this new? I am sure that they have been around for quite a while.
Comment by Sean Turvey — June 28, 2010 @ 6:09 am
Ya, I don't see how this is new. I've seen it this way with the photos in my feed for months.
Comment by MPH — June 28, 2010 @ 6:58 am