Facebook Groups: Member Warning System
Project Timeline: Initial concept launch in Q3 2021, follow up work in Q3 2022
Member Warnings is a contextual guidance system that assists Facebook group admins and moderators in addressing accidental or unintentional content violations while preserving the group’s culture.
As the design lead, I proactively identified the opportunity to address shortcomings in the Facebook group member experience that negatively impacted group engagement. I proposed and secured team leadership support to launch an initial experiment for the Member Warning initiative.
Problem
Facebook group admins and moderators lack tools to provide guidance and context when taking punitive actions against group members. As a result, members often feel dismissed, leading to decreased participation in the group.
Facebook group admins and moderators are limited to harsh enforcement actions, such as temporarily suspending or banning members, often without providing any explanation.
In this scenario, Cyrus posted some photos in the group intending to connect and engage with other members. However, he was unaware that his post violated group rules by not adhering with the group’s topic.
Unfortunately, admins and moderators are limited in their ability to guide members like Cyrus in aligning to group rules and norms. In this scenario, an admin suspends him, temporarily disabling his ability to post or comment in the group.
Cyrus is not informed about the reason for his suspension or how he can address the issue. He may not even recall what he posted. As a result, he feels blindsided, which could lead to reduced engagement or even retaliatory behavior in the group once his suspension is lifted.
Research Insights
Group members are more receptive to enforcement actions when they are made aware about the specific rules or guidelines they violated and provided with clear explanations.
Group admins and moderators have consistently expressed a desire for opportunities to be transparent with members, aiming to build trust, reduce recidivism by giving chances for improvement, and strengthen group culture.
Goals
Empower Facebook group admins and moderators with a more constructive approach to enforcing on content violations, while offering clear explanations to help members understand and re-engage with the group.
Investing in the group member experience and improving member sentiment was a new focus for my team. Facing initial pushback and skepticism about the value of this work, I proposed launching an initial experiment to evaluate and demonstrate its success.
I hypothesized that launching the experiment would reduce violating content and potentially lead to an increase in repeat offender removals.
Design Solutions
Issuing group members warnings to guide behavior and maintain Group Standards
In this experience, admins and moderators can access contextual information, such as rule violations, removed posts, muting history, and Facebook content removals, to make more informed decisions.
The goal is to encourage leniency for well-intentioned, first-time or infrequent offenders, while enabling stronger actions against repeat offenders.
Group members receive and acknowledge warnings to ensure clarity and promote understanding of group guidelines
Members are notified that an increase in warnings may lead to more restrictions on group activity. This feature allows for ongoing iteration, with members having the option to edit their post for re-submission to the group.
Experiment Results
The integrity score at the group level increased, indicating that our goal of reducing group suspension and removals by Facebook due to content violations was successfully achieved.
Views of violating group content significantly decreased, indicating a reduction in problematic posts.
Warnings did not result in decreased group engagement, which was a potential risk we had anticipated.
Qualitative feedback from group members confirmed that they still felt engaged and eager to participate in the group.
Future Considerations
One consideration in extending the Member Warnings strategy is to not only assess how warnings function on an individual level, but also use them as a tool to track overall group health and reduce group violations more broadly.
This conceptual sketch offers admins and moderators a high-level view of potential repeat violators.
There's an opportunity to add bulk action features, such as temporary suspensions, for members with multiple warnings.
Feedback from managed partners of our largest groups was very positive, with admins noting that this concept would help identify overlooked members and take appropriate action.
Personal Reflections
I encouraged our team to explore ways to re-engage members after a warning or enforcement, and to consider a future appeal feature for warnings, allowing members to have a greater voice in the process.