How to Navigate Facebook: A Simple Guide

In the second quarter of 2020, Facebook reported having over 2.7 billion active users worldwide. That means that nearly one in three people across the globe log on to Facebook regularly.

But for a lot of people—including people who already have Facebook accounts—using the famous social media networking website can be a challenge. Whether you’re technology-averse or just haven’t taken the time to familiarize yourself with all of Facebook’s special features, we’re here to help.

Read on to learn more about how to navigate Facebook, how to keep your privacy secure, and which special features you might want to try using.

Getting Started With Facebook

If you’ve never used Facebook before, you’ll need to create an account. Simply go to Facebook.com or download the mobile Facebook app, and choose the “sign up” option. You can use either an email address or a phone number to create your account.

Once you’ve created an account, take some time to fill out your profile. Facebook makes it fairly intuitive to add a profile photo, fill out the basic info about you and your life, and show what you enjoy doing, what you do for a living, and where you’ve lived before.

It’s not uncommon for people’s information to be hacked on Facebook. So after you have a basic profile set up, take some time to navigate Facebook’s privacy settings and set them to your liking.

If you are worried about having your information stolen, you should read more about how to spot hacking attempts.

How to Use Facebook

Now that you’ve learned the first step of how to navigate Facebook, it’s time to use Facebook for its real purpose: Interacting with friends, loved ones, or strangers who share a common interest with you.

The simplest way to do this is by sharing posts, and interacting with others’ posts that appear in your News Feed.

After you add some Facebook friends, you can share photos, videos articles, memes, and general thoughts with all your friends at once. You can also “like,” react, comment on, and share posts from your friends.

That said, there are some things that you’d rather share with friends privately. Fortunately, you can send direct messages to your friends through Facebook’s messenger function or phone app, which is similar to texting or instant messenger.

How to Navigate Facebook’s Special Features

One of the cool things about Facebook is that it has a function for virtually anything you want to do online, or in your social network.

The marketplace tab allows you to buy or sell items in your community. Use groups or “pages” to interact with people who share common interests with you, or leave a review for a business.

When you mark that you are interested in an event, like a concert or book reading, Facebook will remind you when that event is coming up. You can also donate to a friend’s fundraiser, or set up one yourself for a good cause.

Have Fun on Facebook!

While there are a lot of bells and whistles associated with Facebook today, at its heart the website is simply a way for friends and family members to stay connected with each other—and for you to discover new things. So have fun, and find which features you enjoy the most!

If you found this post about how to navigate Facebook helpful, you might want to check out more posts on our site!