Talkster Launches Group Calling Feature On Facebook

Facebook may soon be the talk of the town - literally.

Marketwatch is reporting that Toronto-based Talkster has launched Talkster Phone Party, which brings Facebook users an easy way to make free Talkster long distance, international, and group conference calls, directly from their Facebook profile pages.

According to the pub, with Talkster's Phone Party on Facebook, people can set up their calls from their Facebook profile page, select the friends they want to call, and even add other phone numbers from outside Facebook to be included in a group party call.

Talkster, an advertising supported telephony company that delivers mobile voice and text communications to online communities, will use advertising and special personalized offers to cover the cost of the calls.

"With Talkster's Phone Party you can bring up to five of your Facebook friends together for a free chat," James Wanless, Talkster co-founder and COO tells Marketwatch. "Setting up the Talkster calls with other Facebook users all over the world is as simple as selecting them from your friends list, and with Talkster there are never any long distance or international calling charges. Because you may not be comfortable sharing your phone number with some of the people you have in your friends list, Talkster never exposes your personal phone number."

It remains to be seen how cumbersome these ad-supported calls are, of course. Sitting through a 30-second spot as you try to make a phone call - and forcing everyone else to do the same in a conference call environment - could get old, fast.

(Update: A Talkster rep tells me a single 10-second (or less) ad is played while the call is being connected. From there, the caller has the opportunity to opt in for an SMS coupon after the call - but it's purely optional).

But for a certain demo, this might may perfect sense - and makes Facebook a kind of phonebook for the digital age.

Read all about it, here.

Quick links:

BRANDING UNBOUND The Blog
BRANDING UNBOUND The Book
ADWEEK Magazines Excerpt
Rick Mathieson.com

Comments

[Silvio]

I understand that for the invitation process, when a person calls, the other must call back while the other stays on waiting. However, after the invitation process must you follow the same routine everytime you want to call or can I just call directly, without making the other person calll me back? That is the unclear part.

[heidi]

cool

[Melissa]

Thanks for the write-up Rick! Just a quick note to let you know that while Talkster calls are ad-supported, the ads are never 30-seconds long, and will not interupt your call.

Talkster simply plays a 10-second (or less) audio add while the call is being connected. From there, callers have the opportunity to opt in for an SMS coupon to recieve after their call (but that part is totally optional). After they listen to the single 10-second ad, the call is connected and they can talk as long as they like with no talk time limits.

Thanks again for the mention, and we hope you will check out Talkster for yourself! www.Talkster.com