Claiming conversations between users and non-users of a social networking system

A computer program product comprising a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium containing computer program code that, when executed by a processor, causes the processor to:

• store a user profile for each of a plurality of users of a social networking system;
• receive a request to establish a conversation that includes one or more of the users of the social networking system and an additional user, the additional user identified by an item of contact information that is not stored as contact information for any user profile of the plurality of users of the social networking system;
• establish the conversation between the one or more users of the social networking system and the additional user identified in the request by causing a message to be provided to the one or more users via the social networking system and to the additional user via the item of contact information;
• create a record for the additional user, the record including the item of contact information and an association with the conversation;
• receive, at the social networking system, a reply to the message from the item of contact information, the reply sent by the additional user via the item of contact information;
• add the reply to the established conversation for viewing by the one or more users of the social networking system;
• subsequent to the conversation, receive, at the social networking system, a claim by a claiming user of the social networking system, the claim identifying the item of contact information as belonging to a user profile of the claiming user;
• verify that the item of contact information belongs to the claiming user;
• and
• store an association, by a computing device, between the conversation identified by the item of contact information claimed by the claiming user and the user profile of the claiming user.

A method comprising:

• storing a user profile for each of a plurality of users of an online system;
• receiving a request to establish a conversation between one or more users of the online system and an additional user identified by an item of contact information that is not stored as contact information for any user profile of the plurality of users of the online system;
• establishing the conversation between the one or more users of the online system and the additional user identified in the request by:
• sending, via the online system, a message to the one or more users;
• and
• sending, via the item of contact information, the message to the additional user;
• receiving, at the online system, a reply to the message from the item of contact information, the reply sent by the additional user via the item of contact information;
• adding the reply to the established conversation for viewing by the one or more users of the online system;
• subsequent to the conversation, receiving, at the online system, a claim by the additional user, the claim identifying the item of contact information as belonging to a user profile of one of the plurality of users of the online system;
• verifying that the item of contact information belongs to the additional user;
• and
• storing an association, by a computing device, between the conversation identified by the item of contact information and the user profile.