In the six years that I've been a member of Facebook (I know, right?) they've unveiled hundreds of changes to the platform.
The vast majority are met with resounding groans and vows to leave the social networking site, and then promptly forgotten as most users concede that the new design is usually better than the previous.
However, did you know that almost every major change to Facebook's GUI is accompanied by a detailed note from the development team illustrating why the choice was made, the inspiration behind it, and exactly how it works?
Take the new "theatre style" photo viewing.
In this note, the developer's cite the their reasons for retooling the feature, which Facebook hopes will compete with other photo-sharing sites, such as Flickr.
When we looked to revamp the Photos experience, we faced many challenges. While Photos is one of the most core experiences on Facebook, with over 100 million photos uploaded per day, it’s supported by some of the oldest code in the system and was in dire need of an upgrade.
By redesigning the Photo Viewer, users now view over 5% more photos, equating to an increase in roughly a billion photo views every day.
So what can your credit union learn from this? Many times credit unions are fearful to change their websites or online banking centers because of potential member backlash, especially from older members. However, this leaves credit unions with stale, difficult to use interfaces that, while retaining older members, alienate younger, potential ones.
When Facebook implements a change, here is the information they supply to their members:
- Why. In this case, the code used for photos was old and outdated, making it difficult for members to use reliably.
- How. They illustrate the precise methods of how they came to make the new design.
- When. When does this begin to affect me?
Transparency is the key here. Instead of just making a change and saying "deal with it," by letting members in on the process and the reasons why, your credit union can use this as an opportunity to keep members in the loop and make them feel a part of the institution.
What do you think? Can you see this method backfiring in any way? Let me know in the comments!
DeAndre