Facebook Groups, one of the underestimated and sometimes forgotten features of the platform now holds extreme importance to the company as it works towards building a cohesive community. Thus, the social networking giant is planning to give the Groups their very own moment in the limelight.
As confirmed by Facebook, the company has started testing the addition of a completely new ‘Groups’ tab to its core smartphone app on iOS devices. This new tab appears in the bottom navigation bar, towards the left of the settings menu, alongside the Earth-shaped notification icon, main news feed, friend request and other tabs. The said change has not been observed on Android devices as of yet.
New Groups icon on #Facebook‘s tab bar. #SocialMedia pic.twitter.com/3disVgiTHC
— Frankie Fermi (@frankiefermi) June 5, 2017
Now, tapping into the ‘Groups’ section of the app opens up several new possibilities of Groups for you to join and participate in a cohort of discussions. The said tab is further divided into three sections — Groups, Discover and Create. The first option displays your favorite and recently visited groups, the Discover section enables you to join new Groups based on different categories like — funny, food, sports and others, and the final option now allows you to become an admin and help others in need. Talking on the same, a Facebook spokesperson said:
This is a test to help people more easily navigate Facebook and find what is interesting to them.
In his lengthy manifesto released a couple months ago, CEO Mark Zuckerberg emphasized the importance of community building as the next step in his mission to connect people from across the globe. Facebook has managed to bring together close to 2 billion users and now wants to tap into the said user base to make something meaningful out of its platform. Thus, the Groups can play a major role in the upliftment of the community, where we can help each other out.
With regards to the same, Facebook has decided to invite Group members from across the globe to attend their first Communities Summit later this month. This will give admins a chance to meet other Group leaders, while also learning about new tools (like the recently debuted screening process) that’ll help them further the involvement of users and their approach to the group. Stay tuned for more updates related to Groups as Facebook will continue to build upon the same.
