September 21, 2011 - 14:38 AMT
Facebook to launch new buttons

During The Facebook f8 developer conference which is set for this week, Facebook is planning to introduce ‘read’, ‘watched’ and ‘listened’ buttons.

These buttons, which will supplement the Facebook ‘like’ button, will allow Facebook users to share and indicate appreciation for content with friends and subscribers, SearchEngineJournal reported.

Although it is not immediately clear what Facebook will do with the additional data these buttons collect, the information should enable Facebook to offer a more customized user experience. In addition, the segmented data set will provide advertisers with information that will allow them to more effectively target their audience using the Facebook ad platform.

In addition to the ‘read’, ‘watched’ and ‘listened’ buttons, Facebook is planning to launch a ‘want’ button. The social commerce ‘want’ button, which is anticipated to launch shortly after the new sharing buttons, will act as a social indicator regarding products a user would like to purchase.