Facebook’s chief outlines plans to reintegrate messaging into the main app

Messaging is making a comeback on Facebook as the platform looks to capture emerging usage trends.

In a new overview of its development plans for the app, Facebook chief Tom Alison shared an update on where Facebook is at — which mostly seems like getting on the AI ​​hype train without really revealing much about any specific new AI plans. .

In a vision statement for the platform, Alison discusses how AI will be incorporated into Facebook in a variety of ways, including:

• Using AI to recommend relevant scrolls to users
• Using AI to recommend relevant public groups and group content
• Using AI to highlight emerging creators who might be interesting

Yes, we already know that Meta uses machine learning and systematic recommendations to highlight relevant content, it’s not discovery or updating. But again, it looks like Facebook wants to get in on the AI ​​hype with a little “hey, we use AI too” kind of thing.

But this element is the most interesting aspect:

“We send more than 140 billion messages through our apps every day. On Instagram, people are already re-sharing scrolls 1 billion times a day via DMs, and on Facebook we’re seeing a strong increase in private sharing of scrolls as well. We’re testing whether people can access their Messenger inbox within the Facebook app, and we’ll be expanding that testing soon.”

Yes, seven years after Meta forced users to download a separate Messenger app to maintain their messaging chats, the company is now looking to re-integrate messaging into the main app.

This is the result of a broader shift towards private messaging and a shift away from public posting. Both Mark Zuckerberg and Instagram boss Adam Mosseri noticed this change with Mosseri explained last July that:

“Friends post a lot more in stories and send a lot more DMs than they do in the feed.“

Indeed, the fresh internal report He showed it from Meta while overall time spent on Facebook and Instagram is increasing, creation and engagement are decreasing, and fewer people are posting personal updates than before.

This usual change has seen Meta focus more on messaging interaction, with new options like Instagram “Channels” allowing users to receive more direct information from creators within DMs, essentially the feed. simulating its updates, but as messages instead.

Now it looks like DMs are also being melted right back into the Facebook experience. Which can be a good thing, as it makes it easier to share more content with close friends and family. But it can also devalue the standalone Messenger app and make it a less necessary option.

Otherwise, it will have no effect. I mean, you can already share Facebook posts through Messenger with the direct share button, and more people are used to interacting across the two platforms.

But this could be another shift in this trend that will see more engagement through DMs rather than within the Facebook feed.

The important note here is that many of your Facebook interactions are now likely to be less visible to you in terms of direct engagement, which can be another consideration for marketers when mapping out their strategy and engaging with their audience.

This update, if adopted, could further exacerbate this shift.