Nielsen traffic claims are inaccurate says Facebook says

by Sarah Crawley-Boevey, Media Week 26-Feb-08, 11:55

LONDON - Facebook has hit back at Nielsen Online research, which suggested the social network’s popularity had dipped during January, by releasing data that shows its UK active user base is on the rise.

Facebook statistics, exclusively obtained by Media Week, suggest that there has been a rise in its UK active user base of more than half a million, rising from 7.7 million in December to 8.3 million in January. Active user data reflects the number of people who have used a site in the past 30 days.

This follows the release of stats from Nielsen Online last week that claimed the social networking phenomenon had suffered its first drop in online traffic, falling 5% from 8.9 million unique users in December to 8.5 million in January.

Facebook stressed it tracks “active monthly users, rather than registered users or unique users”.

Meanwhile, the company’s efforts to commercialise the site are bearing fruit. The number of advertisers now signed up by Blake Chandlee’s in-house sales team have risen from 200 at the start of 2008, to 2,000.

The rapid rise follows its appointment of Microsoft Digital Advertising Solutions to handle its display advertising. The first UK-brokered ad deals went live at the beginning of December with Orange, The Carphone Warehouse and Gumtree among the early advertisers.

Microsoft secured the ad sales deal after buying a 1.6% stake in Facebook for £115m in October. It is expected to build on its relationship with Facebook by moving into areas, such as mobile advertising and embedding Microsoft Live Search into the site.