Twitter announced that it is launching an updated "find friends" tab with follow recommendations called Twitter Connect.
This robust new recommendation system will help users find new accounts to follow based on their activity on Twitter.
"[F]inding new accounts to follow used to require jumping through a few hoops and a dash of luck," Twitter blog announcement reads. "Starting today, you'll see a detailed list of people and accounts we think you'll enjoy following, all easily accessible in one place."
Twitter Connect bases its recommendations on many data points including liked tweets, popular accounts by interest and region, trending accounts based on world events, people users already follow, and more. The recommendations will also include information on why it was recommended and can allow users to further tweak and explore their recommended twitter follows. Additionally, Twitter said that it will continue to update and refine the recommendation algorithm to improve over time.
The update is included with the new iOS and Android update that launched on May 3. The connect feature can be accessed by tapping the icon on the upper left hand corner of the screen. Another useful feature in the update is contact sync. Through this feature, users can synchronize their contact list with Twitter and receive a notification when one of their friends signs up for a Twitter account.
In February, Twitter released a report that showed that it had relatively zero user growth for the first time since the platform launched and in April, it reported slower revenue growth than analysts expected causing the stock prices to fall 11 percent.
The social platform also took another hit when a report leaked showing a gradual decline in total tweets, Tech Times reported. At its peak in August 2014, users were sending an average 661 million tweets per day. However, in January 2016, users sent 303 million tweets on average per day, about 50 percent decline in just under two years.
Twitter has been updating the platform and adding new features to attract new users. In October 2015, it launched the Moments tab which allowed users to review curated tweets highlighting events in world news. In April, Twitter also announced a deal with the NFL to stream 10 Thursday Night Football games on the platform.
Twitter hopes that these fresh updates will improve user discoverability and help new users access and engage with the powerful network more easily.
