On Wednesday, popular social network Facebook rolled out an experimental feature - `Promote' - to a limited number of users in the US, giving them the ability to promote important photos or announcements by making a payment to the company.

Despite the fact that Facebook has not made any official confirmation about the exact number of US users who can now access the `Promote' option, the company has said that only a "limited subset" of the approximately 166 million US users of the Facebook site can access the new feature. In addition, it has also revealed that the "limited subset" comprises those US users who have less than 5,000 friends and subscribers.

The new `Promote' feature which Facebook has recently released to a small group of US users was initially tested out in May for New Zealand users; and was later extended to selected user groups in 20 countries.

Going by the information shared by the users who have accessed the new `Promote' feature, and paid for driving their important pictures and announcements - like that of a garage sale or a charity drive or an engagement - up their friends' newsfeeds, the cost of a promoted post is nearly $7.

However, the `Promote' price-tag revealed by the users of the feature is apparently a part of the testing of the feature; more so as a Facebook spokeswoman has disclosed that "a variety of prices" are currently under consideration by the social network.