Last week, Facebook introduced the latest round of changes to its ever-popular social network site, including a reordering of the news feed and well as a reimagining of the user profile known as “Timeline”.  As always, these changes were met with much outcry, some positive but mostly negative, from the site’s vocal user base.  So the question is, why does Facebook even bother to change its site experience when updates are constantly met with cynicism.  I decided to take a look at some of the pros and cons for Facebook, as a dominant market power, to continue to proactively change.

Pros

Avoid Complacency

It’s easy to forget that less than 3 years ago, MySpace, not Facebook, was the market leader in social networking.  While the cause of MySpace’s downfall is debatable, one prominent theory is that while sites like Facebook and Twitter continued to develop new features, MySpace failed to innovate.  Now that the tables have turned and Facebook has snagged the #1 spot, they still need to innovate to avoid falling into the same trap as MySpace.

Ultimately, by improving their service, Facebook is trying to get users to spend more of their time on the site.  This can be done by presenting the most relevant “news” to users (see news feed changes) or by expanding horizontally into new feature areas (see Facebook music).  In the end, the more time the user spends on Facebook, the more advertising revenue Facebook is able to capture.

Any News is Good News

The same axiom from the entertainment industry can be applied to social networks.  Changes to Facebook are front page news – not just on the tech blogs, but on CNN, and other forms of mainstream media.  This drives traffic to the site, to see what the buzz is about.  When Facebook is “trending” on Twitter, you know that you’re probably still in an alright position.

Really, What are you Going to Do About it?

Especially in the US, the market has tipped in social networks.  There are 800 million users worldwide.  All of your friends are on Facebook.  The irony of situation is reflected in the choice of forum where users choose to voice their complaints about changes to Facebook – Facebook itself, of course.

Even if you truly hate the latest round of changes and want to quit, where are you going to go?  Relocating to Google + only works if you can convince all of your friends to go with you.  It doesn’t matter that your local TechCrunch blogger raves about it, or that Circles are better than Groups, in the end the effort to transfer all 750 of your friends to a new network is too powerful a force to overcome.

Cons

Alienate the Fan Base

Yes Facebook is huge, but they still risk alienating users by deviating from a winning formula.  Admittedly, it seems unlikely that a rearrangement of the news feed is going to cause users to quit Facebook and spend all their time on Google +.  However, users may decrease their total number of visits to Facebook or their average time spent per visit.  This can affect Facebook’s business model in two important ways – less user clicks on advertising, and diminished capability to capture user data.  Both of these have effects on the prices that Facebook can charge advertisers.

In the end, I come out on the “pro” side of this debate.  I think Facebook is actually pretty brilliant, in that it recognizes that it has leeway to fail.  This allows them the freedom to develop and introduce some radical changes, and some innovative new features, without much risk to its business.  Worst case scenario the changes are undone.  But more often than not they improve the Facebook experience, and sometimes can even revolutionize the social networking space.  So next time Facebook updates the wall, or the news feed, or how you view your photos – just quit complaining!

“With this new FB change, I might go CB…CB radio, that is”

This week, Facebook updated its format, a change which was met with an outpouring of user complaints. Facebook members loudly and frequently expressed their frustrations with the new system, likening it to a shift towards MySpace-style clutter, and lamenting anew the sacrifices Facebook had made to their privacy. These posts are nothing new: each time Facebook updates its user interface, many users express the frustration and suspicion that arises as a result of these changes. Many people spend hours a day on Facebook, and changes in the interface disrupt their habitual use, forcing them to adopt new behaviors, often limiting access to or doing away with entirely their favored features. And so, they vent. And where do they do it? Well, on Facebook, of course.

Contrast this to LinkedIn, which failed to substantively update its user interface for many years — one critic said it “looks like it should be accessible only to those using 486 processors.” When LinkedIn finally updated its user interface in 2010, users praised it for its improved usability, increased ease of accessing information, and more visually pleasing layout. Very few lamented the transition, perhaps because users had been waiting so long for its arrival.

To provide one more point of contrast, take Zynga, with its strong core of die-hard users. When it conducts A/B testing on new features or releases, as almost all social media companies do, its most avid users take to the fan pages to discuss these new features. When group A users receive the new features earlier than group B, though, many of the die-hard fans in group B become frustrated, feeling that Zynga is somehow favoring group A. This often takes the form of social media backlash: they post eagerly, and sometimes in a hostile fashion, about their frustrations NOT receiving the updates in a timely fashion, feeling that they have been marginalized by a selection process that is far more random than their comments imply they believe.

At what point, and for what types of businesses, does it make more sense to be update the user interface quickly and aggressively, to be on the bleeding edge of innovation; even when you risk alienating customers? When is A/B testing a liability, as it can decrease the perception of fairness? And in which businesses does it make the most sense to delay innovation, to reduce investment in user interface until the business has an in-depth understanding of user needs, and the passage of time has created strong latent demand, such that when the innovation occurs, users are unlikely to be disappointed?

By: Beth Huddleston