Who Are Your 10 BFFs on Facebook? This App Will Tell You

By Todd Wasserman at Mashable: 
A Facebook app created by Visa in conjunction with the NFL will help you assemble a team of your 10 closest Facebook friends for a Super Bowl-themed video designed to promote a contest run by the credit card brand.
The “You+10 Draft,” which went live on Thursday, scrapes your Facebook Page to analyze your most recent interactions and then creates a list of your 10 BFFs. After that, it churns out a video featuring the 10, who are assigned roles like “commentator,” “No. 1 fan” and “photographer” and are highlighted with a mock-heroic football-style voiceover.
The 10 people chosen are friends who you would presumably bring to the Super Bowl if you won a sweepstakes from Visa. That contest offers a cardholder the chance to attend Super Bowl XLVI in Indianapolis on Feb. 5 with 10 friends and family members. The sweeps, promoted since November, randomly award a Visa cardholder who made a transaction between early November and Dec. 27 with the card. (You could have also entered via snail mail without buying anything.)
Alex Craddock, head of North America marketing for Visa, says the app and the sweeps are based on one insight: that 88% of people who watch football do it with others. “It’s very social to the core,” Craddock says of football.
There’s a potentially viral component built in to the app, which Visa developed with its ad agency, AKQA. As with other Facebook app-vertising campaigns that play on users’ narcissism, this one beckons consumers with the promise of learning more about themselves. But in this case, there’s a strong incentive to send the video to some of the 10 who made the cut. (You can also sub in others if you didn’t like who the app picked.)
However, going strictly by Facebook data has its disadvantages. The list the app created for me, for example, included a few people I barely know. Still, this is an interesting Super Bowl tie-in for a brand — especially given that Visa is not planning to run an ad during the big game.
Did you try the app? Is it an effective promotion? Sound off in the comments.