Facebook Reels has been getting its intended engagement as of late, which is good news for Meta as it tries to compete with the short-form video app, TikTok. Now, there are new features that help users personalize the Reels that they come across.
Quick and Personalized Reels Discovery
Facebook Reels has been seeing success with its engagements, specifically, the re-sharing of videos in other apps. It has grown twice in number over the last six months, resulting in the short-form videos being reshared two billion times in a day.
To keep the momentum, Facebook will be placing Reels at the top of Facebook Watch, making it easier to discover and access content from creators, trends, and content that align with your interests. Switching from long-form to short-form videos will also be easier.
Users will also be able to choose whether they want to see more or less of certain Reels depending on their content. Through the three-dot menu at the bottom of the videos just below the Share button, they'll have the option to tap "Show More" and "Show Less."
The former option will allow the algorithm to show you more videos of the same context temporarily, while the latter will do the opposite. The feedback will affect the ranking score of the Reels which will affect the content that will appear on your feed.
Other forms of labels will also appear to inform you why the content is appearing in the first place, such as a friend liking the video. This provides users an idea of what type of content their Facebook friends enjoy as well, bringing a wider scope for discovery.
The "Show More" and "Show Less" features have already been applied to Facebook Feed posts last year in early October. Like Reels, the direct feedback will contribute to the platform's machine learning, which makes the AI system that suggests content more personalized.
Personalizing Your Feed
Facebook also has more features for people to be able to have various actions for each post, which also affects the visibility of the author of the content on your timeline. Such tools are Favorites and Snooze, which can be found in Feed Preferences.
To add Favorites, you can head to Settings & Privacy on Facebook, and then Feed. Upon clicking on Favorites, you can manage how you add accounts or pages. To do so, simply click the star icon beside the name of the page or account.
Once you add them to your favorites, their posts will be shown higher in your newsfeed when you open the app or refresh it. The newest posts will appear first, and friends and pages won't be notified if you add them to the Favorites list.
Snoozing will allow you to "mute" the posts of a profile, page, or group for 30 days. This means that their posts will not appear on your timeline in the 30-day duration. You can Snooze someone through a post by tapping on the three-dot menu in your feed.
