Facebook testing the 'Want' button

Facebook, with the assistance of a few selected companies, is currently testing a new feature called Collections which will enable companies to share information about their products and make eventual sales.

Facebook's Collections test comprises of three actions being tested separately, the company said, naming them as ‘Want’, ‘Like’, and ‘Collect’. Through Collections users, or fans, will be able to create wishlists of retail products they want to buy.

Basically, in addition to liking products, users when clicking on ‘Want’ will flag images of products they want to purchase or that are in the process of ‘collecting’. Those notes will then be visible to the users' friends on their Timelines and there will be a ‘Buy’ link for each product in a Collection that links to a place to buy it offsite.

Seven pilot retailers, including Pottery Barn, Victoria's Secret, Neiman Marcus, Michael Kors, Smith Optics, Wayfair and Fab.com, are in testing now. I visited some of them but could not see any Want button so I assume it is only being tested in the US market.

E-commerce is where Facebook seems to be heading by offering its 1 billion users a way to buy products for their friends. Facebook however said that it won’t charge any fee for any transaction.