Facebook is joining the crowded marketplace of companies offering deals, by launching the appropriately named, “Deals.” The social network will attempt to break into five test markets today and will try to pull users from Groupon and LivingSocial. The five test markets include Austin, Dallas, Atlanta, San Diego and San Francisco.
The spin on Facebook’s service is that it plans to offer deals for events that have a social emphasis, which a person is likely to do with others. Examples of such activities include concerts, whitewater rafting, movies, sporting events, camping, races, classes, various local gatherings and more.
Facebook has more than 600 million users and is banking on the ability to target a user’s interests and capitalize on the social networking between friends to share and find deals with each other. Deals can be received via email and will show up in a user’s news feed.
Deals can be purchased with a credit card or Facebook Credits, the company’s virtual currency. Until the launch, Credits was only used to buy virtual goods inside games and digital products like movie rentals. The company will use its internal sales team to approach businesses interested in offering Deals.
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