Tuesday, September 22, 2020

Facebook's Desperate Attempt to Attract and Hold On To Zoomers

     Recently Facebook announced the launch of Facebook Campus, which offers students a private place to connect with students. After the launch, Twitter blew up with a multitude of Facebook is reinventing itself as Facebook jokes as the social media site goes back to it's roots. This is just another step in Facebook's attempt to reach Gen-Z as the generation interacts less with Facebook itself just as they have become a must target group.

    Over the past couple of years, Facebook has gotten a reputation for attracting an older population (including older millennials). As this spread- zoomers and younger millennials have fled to Instagram, Snapchat and TikTok as their newsfeeds have become taken over by their parents, older relatives, and new parents. Simultaneously, Facebook has become obsessed with its competition- buying Instagram and eventually using that platform to compete with Snapchat through IG Stories. Now with the rise of TikTok (which is not only seeing daily use amongst Zoomers but also has a very long usage time) they're attempting to launch a similar product on IG.This has led them to hold on to Zoomers from an overall perspective but still hasn't convinced younger people to use Facebook Daily. 

    While it seems interesting in theory, I'm not sure that Zoomers will change their minds about Facebook just because they launch Facebook Campus. Facebook needs to go back to the drawing board and understand how Zoomers interact with each other and how they like to spend their time on social media. Some studies have shown that Zoomers mostly use social media to find entertaining content- and Facebook Campus won't be fulfilling that need. Additionally, Facebook's data breaches and multiple scandals helps push away a generation that craves transparency and authenticity. If Facebook really wants to attract Zoomers to their platform they should focus on changing their reputation and branding.

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