Tuning Out the Noise: How to Remove Irrelevant "Suggested for You" Posts on Facebook

Facebook‘s "Suggested for You" algorithm aims to personalize your News Feed by serving posts aligned to your interests. But between privacy concerns, excessive clicks, and simply missing the mark, many users find removing these automatic recommendations drastically improves their experience.

As a long-time tech geek and social media advisor, I‘ll outline actionable tools to eliminate suggestions – and share insider insight into why they backfire in the first place. By fine tuning Facebook‘s machine learning to focus on what you care about, you can retake control of your feed.

Accessing Ad Preferences to Adjust Suggestions

First, locate the Ad Preferences menu where Facebook manages interest categories used for recommendations:

On Desktop:

1. Click the down arrow at top right
2. Select "Settings & Privacy"
3. Choose "Settings"
4. Click "Ads" in left sidebar
5. Select "Ad Preferences"

On Mobile Apps:

1. Tap menu icon (three horizontal lines)
2. Scroll down and tap "Settings & Privacy"
3. Tap "Settings"
4. Tap "Ads"
5. Select "Ad Preferences"

This opens your ad topics dashboard with all the categories Facebook uses for Suggested Posts:

For any you want to see less of, tap the three dots and select "See Less." Keep adjusting until suggestions skew towards your actual interests.

Why You Should Remove Irrelevant Suggestions

Before going further, let‘s analyze why untargeted recommendations can be so problematic:

Excessive Distractions Destroy Focus

Even if the underlying post has no relevance, certain cues manipulate the primal parts of our brain towards irresistible curiosity. Stanford researchers found that "suggested posts provide novel stimuli that capture attention by arousing curiosity without requiring cognitive supervision."

In other words, Facebook may keep suggestions around simply because they could grab your attention – even if you don‘t actually care about the content. This leaves less bandwidth for the updates you do care about.

Privacy Concerns Around Data Use

Suggestions also raise reasonable privacy questions. To target recommendations, Facebook utilizes personal data from both past platform activity as well as external sites using their pixel or cookies.

In a 2021 Consumer Reports survey, 60% of respondents said targeted social media ads make them uncomfortable. And 74% said they wanted more control over how platforms use their personal data, which ambiguous Suggested Posts embody.

Relevance Remains a Major Algorithm Limitation

And despite Facebook‘s advancing AI, their machine learning still shows fundamental gaps around understanding user contexts and interests.

Their models excel at statistical correlations to determine, for example, that users who like Topic A also tend to engage with Topic B. But harder to discern are the multitudinous reasons why someone engages each post.

As Meta AI Researcher Dhruv Kumar explains: "Perceiving relevance is fundamentally harder than perceiving statistical patterns because relevance is often subjective or contextual."

Without enough contextual signals, you end up with overly random or flat out pointless suggestions.

Customize Suggestions Based on Your Interests

Now let‘s leverage Facebook‘s controls to shape suggestions around topics you actually care about:

Hide Irrelevant Posts

If a pointless suggestion still shows up, hide it:

1. Tap the three dot icon
2. Select "Hide Post"

This provides a relevance signal to Facebook used for future suggestions.

Snooze Problematic Pages

For Pages generating multiple irrelevant suggestions, snooze them for 30 days via the three dot menu on their profile.

Fully Block Pages

To completely remove a Page from suggestions, select "Hide All from Page" using the same profile menu for pages you never wish to see again.

Alternative Approaches to Limit Suggestions

Beyond platform controls, third party tools provide additional filters for suggestions:

Use Browser Extensions

Extensions like F.B. Purity apply custom filters, keyword blocking, and more granular feed management. But approach extensions cautiously by vetting security and access permissions first.

Evaluate a Facebook Hiatus

If you still see overly random suggestions even after maximizing controls, consider a 1-2 week break from the platform. This resets the algorithm and underlying data used to populate suggestions. Just don‘t permanently delete your account without downloading data first.

Upon returning from a social media detox, leverage tools covered here to re-tune suggestions from a fresh slate.

Key Takeaways for Reclaiming Your Feed

While ideal in theory, Facebook‘s Suggested for You often misses the mark in practice. But by leveraging insider techniques like:

• Adjusting Ad Preferences
• Hiding Irrelevant Posts
• Snoozing Problematic Pages
• Trying Alternative Filters

You can optimize suggestions for topics you genuinely care about – not just what an algorithm thinks you want to see. Eliminate noise and distractions to focus your feed on the connections that matter most.