Social search engine gets a little help from your friends

by Dan Leahul, revolutionmagazine.com 29-Jun-09, 16:14

LONDON - Aardvark, the social media search engine that recruits Facebook friends to help give advice, has fully rolled out of private beta and is keen on giving a human touch to the standard search.

Instead of traditional search engines, such as Google or Bing, where users are required to search for what they need, using keywords to scour for relevant web pages, Aardvark helps users find what they want by asking others who are in the know.

Users can set up Aardvark on their instant messenger or email client and Facebook Connect, where it is presumed other users have also set up the service, and then ask the website a question, for example: 'What's a great place to go biking around London?'

Aardvark will then present the question to your contacts and their contacts based on their category of expertise, anything from music, books, food, movies, who can then choose to anonymously ignore or give a reply.

Brands have reportedly been clamouring to find their way into the website's private conversations between users, with online retailers such as Amazon and Zappos already climbing on board.

The company raised over $5m in funding from August Capital and Baseline Ventures last year.

Aardvark currently has over 10,000 registered users. The company said for every question asked, on average eight people will be contacted, two of which who will provide an answer. Answers usually come in under five minutes.