Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Is Facebook Lite Working For Facebook?

Buzz this

It has been slightly more than a month since the launch of Facebook Lite, a stripped down version of Facebook to serve areas where broadband connection speed is slow.

But is Lite working for Facebook?

Perhaps a simple study of Facebook’s growth statistics can help us with the answer.

According to Compete’s data, Facebook has grown from 122 million to 124 million unique visits over the month of September. That is an improvement of 2 million visits!

But can we credit this success to Facebook Lite?

Facebook stats

For the months of June, July and August, Facebook’s growth has been stagnant in terms of unique visits. Each month saw 122 million visits except for September, when we saw a more significant growth of 1.93%, reaching a new high at 124 million. Don’t be deceived by the small percentage, being able to attract yet another 2 million unique visitors is no easy feat when Facebook is already so big. Seems like it is nowhere near saturation yet!

Facebook Lite was live on 10th September. Would it be reasonable to take Facebook Lite as a contributor to this growth?

Unfortunately, this assumption cannot be validated until we know where these 2 million new visitors are coming from. Only if a bulk of them are from places where broadband connection are slow should we consider Lite as a catalyst to Facebook’s growth.