Facebook Offers Poll Access to its 25 Million Users

Social networking web site Facebook has launched a new polling feature called Facebook Polls, enabling marketers to pose quick questions to its vast user base.

Users can be segmented according to gender, age, school, location or profile keyword to gauge interest in a particular topic. Companies can then target detailed questions to specific user groups and receive real-time responses through a 'news feed'. However, Facebook says it will not guarantee results, nor verify the accuracy or statistical significance of response data.

Facebook charges a $5 set-up fee and then an amount based on the number of responses a company indicates it needs, multiplied by the amount that it is willing to pay per response. The more a firm pays per response, the faster Facebook delivers complete results.

The new service supports a single text based question and up to five text based answers, and users can only select a single answer. The firm says it may support more formats in the future.

The site was originally developed for college and university students but has since taken off rapidly among other users. People can select to join one or more participating networks, such as a school, place of employment, or geographic region.

The UK has more than 1.4 million active Facebook users, third only behind the US and Canada. Other countries in order of active users include Norway, Australia, South Africa, Lebanon, Egypt, Sweden and India. Facebook employs around 200 staff based at its Californian headquarters and New York office and is online at www.facebook.com .

All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas, 2024- by Nick Thomas, unless otherwise stated.