What’s Buzzing: Facebook Updates, Uber Tree Service & More

This week brought us updates from Facebook, including an algorithm change that will prioritize high-quality content in a user’s News Feed and a new feature that will allow users to more easily curate their Feeds. We also were given a quick and easy solution for transporting Christmas trees (one without the struggle of strapping it to the top of a vehicle), as rumors swirled regarding a potential private messaging feature on the Instagram horizon. Find out more below.

Home Depot Delivers Christmas Trees Using Uber App

Home Depot has teamed up with car service company, Uber, to provide a Christmas tree delivery service for customers this holiday season. As of this Thursday, shoppers in major cities like New York, Boston and Los Angeles were given the opportunity to purchase a netted tree with a stand, pay for it ($135) using their Uber account and have it delivered to their home via the car company. While Home Depot does typically deliver trees during the holiday season, this promotion allowed consumers to have their trees on their doorsteps right away rather than having to wait a couple of days to receive it.

Photo via Adweek

Instagram’s Potential New Messaging Feature

According to GigaOm’s Om Malik, Instagram may very well be working on a new private messaging feature — with a possible holiday launch. Last week, TechCrunch revealed a list of Instagram.com email addresses that were delivered to an unnamed e-commerce company that purchased the aggregated list. In an ongoing battle with other visual services, the messaging feature would be yet another way for the company to expand its appeal to its growing user base (currently at 200 million).There is currently little knowledge as to how this messaging feature would impact the platform specifically, but it’s probable that the update will strengthen communication between brands and their followers.

Facebook Updates News Feed Algorithm to Prioritize High-Quality Content

Facebook has announced an algorithm update that will prioritize high-quality content over ‘viral’ content (e.g. memes), which will heavily influence the way brands are pushing and positioning their content. In an effort to create more conversation amongst users and help them stay at the forefront of what’s happening in the word, news articles and current event links will be prioritized over memes. Facebook’s referral traffic is higher than ever, meaning that more people are clicking on articles that their friends are sharing. The update will also feature recommended related articles below the original post. It will be interesting to see what constitutes “high-quality” content given that the Facebook algorithm is known to prioritize what users are sharing and interacting with most, regardless of the quality of the publisher.

In related news, Facebook reported this week that organic reach for Pages is on the decline due to the consistent proliferation of content on the News Feed. Read 360i’s POV to learn more.

Photo via Mashable

Facebook Reveals “Unfollow” Feature for News Feed

In an effort to help people curate their News Feeds, Facebook is providing users an opportunity to see more of the content they care about and less of the daily posts from old high school acquaintances with whom they’ve lost touch. The Unfollow button will now allow users to block content from certain friends without having to defriend them. This feature aligns with Facebook’s new push to stay relevant and interesting for each user, and helps users to customize their Feed to include only content they care about and that is most relevant to them personally.

Photo via Mashable

TNT Tweets Script of Mob City Premiere, 140 Characters at a Time

To promote the premiere of its new gangster drama Mob City, TNT live-tweeted the full script of the first episode — 140 characters at a time — up until 30 minutes before the show’s premiere. And to get fans engaged, the network included Twitter Cards to embed other multimedia content such as photos, videos and behind-the-scenes footage and commentary from cast members.

Cover photo via Digital Trends