FB tests subscription groups

Pilot programme helps group admins earn money

You would need to pay for joining groups in Facebook, as the social media giant is piloting a feature called subscription groups. In order to allow group admins to earn more money and increase interaction with members by making it easy, Facebook is piloting a program of paid monthly subscriptions. These subscriptions will reportedly cost anywhere between $5 and $30.

“It is part of our overall approach to help creators and leaders to financially support the work they do to engage their fans and communities. This subscription group’s pilot is testing with a small number of groups across a range of interests who will share input and feedback along the way,” said Alex Deve, product director, groups, in a statement. With subscription group, members are aided with organise activities, checklists, tutorials, live videos and more to help with home organisation. This subscription group pilot is being tested with a small number of groups. They include College Admissions and Affordability. Sarah Mueller started a group called Declutter My Home, which is a way to inspire and motivate others to clean up their homes, and it soon helped lot of people reduce clutter.

Experts say even though this feature benefits only a few people, it will be a game changer in marketing. A. Karthik, digital marketing expert said, “Such updates are useful for grabbing eyeballs to brands producing content. Even though it is data, making it exclusive makes it worthwhile.”

It (payment plan) will be really helpful for admins and publishers. But the amount collected in India cannot be same as that across the world. Some groups created out of passion may turn into business. This is Facebook’s way of getting maximum money out of its platform. But majority of Indians may not prefer to pay for elite subscription of data

— Y. MAHENDRA, Admin for several FB groups