Tag Archive for 'location-based'

Facebook launches Facebook Places.

Published on August 18, 2010 in Facebook, Foursquare, social media, technology and video. View Comments

In Silicon Valley just a few hours ago, Facebook held a event to announce the launch of the much anticipated Facebook Places. The embedded video is a full launch video replay from the live event, if you’d like to see what was said by Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, the Facebook Places team and various partner companies.

For international users, it should be noted from the outset that Facebook Places will only be available in the US at first. Users outside the US will be able to see US Places posts on the web.

Amongst others, partner companies include Gowalla, Yelp and Foursquare. A representative from Gowalla detailed how Gowalla posts will be integrated into Places via the Places API. You can choose to attach an image to a post, as you can in Gowalla now. You’ll also be able to see Gowalla stamps in posts.

The Foursquare representative was less specific about how Foursquare will be integrated, to say the least. In fact you’d have to say he looked a little less than enthusiastic about the whole thing. But hey, how can you refuse to participate in having access to a location-based service that has access to a user–base of more than 500 million users, right?

It was explained at the launch that it is hoped that Facebook users will begin to discover serendipitous moments by checking in to places and finding that other friends are at the same location or nearby.

Facebook Places on iPhone

Facebook Places Tagging Friends

At first, Facebook Places will only be available on the Facebook application for iPhone and can also be accessed by “advanced mobile browers” (meaning those supporting HTML 5 and geolocation) at touch.facebook.com. Mark Zuckerberg said at the launch that there are not Android or Blackberry apps available yet. There are plans for these but no timeline.

In fact, Zuckerberg stated that there are quite a lot of things they aren’t doing with Places yet, including integrating Places with Facebook Events, which seems like a very obvious thing for them to do, especially as they have recently acquired Hot Potato. Zuckerberg said that they want to get things right before launching additional apps and features.

Facebook Places seems to be quite focused on including images and being able to tag friends who are with you when you check–in. You can also post a text update along with your check-in, as you can with most other location–based services.

There’s not a lot that’s new here, but it’s not really about that, is it? What’s significant is that it’s Facebook launching this location-based service. It’s going to be interesting to see just how many of the hundreds of millions of users start using this regularly. Not everyone has an iPhone or a mobile device capable of using the service, so there will be limited numbers to begin with, but still, Five. Hundred. Million. Users, and still growing.

For a full run–down of the features, check out Facebook’s blog post on the subject.

10 examples of businesses in Australia already using Foursquare for marketing.

Published on July 29, 2010 in Australia, Facebook, Foursquare, business, mobile and social media. View Comments

This is part 2 of a two part post about businesses in Australia using Foursquare. Part 1, ‘Local businesses: to use Foursquare (yet) or not, that is the question’, can be found here.

So let’s take a look at what some businesses have been doing with Foursquare in Australia so far. Who are some of these initial experimenters and what are they up to?  There are of course many more examples than I’ve described below.

Café Foursquare Specials

There are many Foursquare Specials already being run by cafés in Australia. In fact, loyalty programs run by cafés, bars and restaurants seem to make up the bulk of all Foursquare specials right now, and perhaps into the future. Here’s just one with a bit of a difference in my hometown.

VIVO Café in Sydney (the George St location) is offering a free coffee with your meal when you check–in. In addition, Angela Vithoulkas, Director of VIVO Café tells me that VIVO is currently inviting people to unlock the Foursquare ‘Swarm’ Badge at the a VIVO Cafe Swarm event, with five dollars of the fifteen dollar cost of a specific meal going to the Sydney Community Foundation.

One thing I noticed about VIVO when I visited the café and met with Angela, is that this particular café is located very close to the Sydney Apple Store, so when you check–in to the Apple Store (which I did before going there), you see an in–app banner notifying you of the “Special Nearby”.

Apple Store on Foursquare

At present, there would have to be a higher percentage of Foursquare users visiting tech stores such as this than many other places in Sydney, so that’s certainly an added bonus for a nearby venue with a Foursquare special.

Multi–City Chain Venue Specials

The Wagamama chain of restaurants offers a Foursquare special that consists of a complimentary miso soup with every main meal, for every fifth check–in. If you’re the Foursquare Mayor you get a free juice with any main meal.

Wagamama has also trialled Twitter tweetups as a way to incorporate social media into the restaurant experience. Michael Fieldcom, who has been involved with their social media strategy, tells me they have run ‘sneak-peeks’ of the new menu to various social media groups. People receive a free meal from the new menu in advance of its release. The sneak peeks are being held at five restaurant locations around Australia.

Ah tweetups, that takes my mind back to the very first Sydney Tweetup in mid 2007, which I co-organised. Twitter was a LOT smaller back then, that’s for sure :)

Curve Cafe + Bar at Vibe Hotel (also at their other venues, including Melbourne) for every second checkin is offering a “buy a drink and get a drink for a friend” deal, plus if you’re the Foursquare mayor you receive a “buy one get one free meal”.

Considering how easy it is to become the mayor in these early days of Foursquare, that’s not a bad deal at all.

Grill’d restaurants in both Melbourne and Sydney are offering a free Mini Chips with a burger or steak sandwich purchase. If you’re the mayor you get a free burger on Fridays.

Corporate Foursquare Special + Meetup

A Microsoft Office Mayor Meetup was held in Martin Place (a central CBD location) back in mid June. Organised by agency Ogilvy 360, Microsoft hosted the “world’s first Foursquare Office Mayor Meetup”, for the launch of Microsoft Office 2010.

Foursquare office-types were encouraged to check–in at the meetup to receive a copy of Office 2010. The first 110 office mayors to queue up got copies, and 300 Office Mayor Meetup t-shirts were also available. 141 people ended up checking in at the meetup.

Potential Local Foursquare Special Clusters?

You know how people often copy what plants and features their neighbours have in their front yard? Well it only stands to reason that we may find that Foursquare offers take off in certain areas in clusters, as venues see other venues in the area take the initiative. “What’s that window cling they have there? Foursquare? What’s that?”.

Melt Bar in Kings Cross, Sydney is offering a “Staff price round of drinks on your 3rd check in”. And just along the road a bit, BurgerFuel is also offering a “buy one, get one free” offer, if you check–in with Foursquare and you bring a friend along.

Not only Food and Drinks

In Brisvegas, at Casa Perdomo, I see an offer for one free Perdomo Cigar for every new visitor who checks in for the first time. Also in Brisbane at Anytime Fitness, I see a free 7 day pass  is available on check–in; a pretty standard gym promo offer.

At the rather exclusive Sanctuary Cove resort on the Gold Coast, I see that Harry’s, boutique is offering a “Check–in and sign up as a VIP to receive a $25 voucher for your next purchase.” deal.

Over in Perth, I see that Connections Nightclub is offering free entry on Friday or Saturday if you check–in before 1am.

On the travel front, in Adelaide the South Australia Visitor and Travel Centre is offering a third night free if you check–in and book a 2 night stay from them.

These are just some examples of Australian businesses using Foursquare right now. As I said at the beginning, there are plenty of others too. If you have any other new and noteworthy examples of Australian businesses using Foursquare already, feel free to tell us about them in the comments.

If you are part of an Australian business and would like to get involved with Foursquare, and would like help with how to approach it for your specific business, don’t hesitate to get in touch with me.

Local businesses: to use Foursquare (yet) or not, that is the question (part 1).

Published on July 27, 2010 in Australia, Facebook, Foursquare, Twitter, business, mobile and social media. View Comments

This is part 1 of a two part post about businesses in Australia using Foursquare. Part 2, ‘10 examples of businesses in Australia already using Foursquare for marketing’, can be found here.

Foursquare only arrived in Australia last November, just 8 months ago. Needless to say, it’s still fairly early days for the location-based service on these (digital) shores.

Foursquare Window Cling

I’m not exactly sure how many Foursquare users there are in Australia right now, but according to one source, there are at least 60,000 in Sydney. It would be great to get a current, official number from the company (none has been forthcoming from the company by the time of this post). It has however been confirmed by Foursquare that they have passed 100 million checkins and have over 2 million users worldwide. This is not huge compared to the likes of Facebook, with now over 500 million users, or Twitter with well over 100 million, but as I said, it’s still early days.

I remember back when Twitter had about 2 million users and was a relatively small community locally. It’s taken about 4 years to go from zero to over 100 million users. It’s changed quite a bit, especially from a marketing standpoint!  With Foursquare, the second million users have been collected in just three months, and they have recently raised $20 million in funding for further development. However, Facebook has flagged that it will be launching a location feature soon, so it’ll be interesting to see how that impacts Foursquare’s fast growing user base.

Forrester has just come out with some research that suggests that Foursquare is still too small for major agencies and their clients to be bothered with, as even in the U.S. only 4% of adults online have ever used location-based mobile apps. Whereas, more than 11% of adults online have used Twitter and an estimated 28% of all internet users have signed up for Facebook.

Well it might be correct to say that in many cases, but I’m here to say that this certainly doesn’t mean it can’t or shouldn’t be used right now in certain circumstances, especially as Foursquare has the potential to be beneficial for many small and medium enterprises, as well at larger companies. I think it all depends on how and why you intend to use it, and how you approach using it.

For instance, if you are wanting to attract tech savvy early adopters (who are all using up-to-date mobile devices and using mobile data regularly) to your business or service , and there are plenty of businesses who would like to do that, why wouldn’t you think about giving it a go? Quite a few of these people are also likely to be heavy users of services such as Twitter and Facebook, which Foursquare checkins are often crossposted to. This group is also also more likely to write blogs.

Foursquare is also at the stage where, if you are a business using it to attract new customers and to reward loyal customers, you might actually get some welcome free media attention (traditional or otherwise) for taking the initiative. This certainly happened when Twitter started to catch on. Journalists take notice of local examples of wider tech and social media trends being used.

When Twitter eventually broke into mass pop culture, when celebrities started using it and talking about it, and it started being the talk of tv the talkshow circuit, some businesses and individuals who had been using it for quite a while benefited from already having experience with this new communications tool. They were one step ahead of the pack.

Could it be similar with Foursquare? Not sure but it’s certainly possible. Time will tell.

So, having said that, in my next post I’m going to take a look at what some businesses have been doing with Foursquare so far in Australia. Who are some of these initial experimenters and what have they been doing with it?

What are your thoughts on businesses using Foursquare at this stage?

Part 2, ‘10 examples of businesses in Australia already using Foursquare for marketing’.

Foursquare gets Wired mag cover, teams with Mashable and CNN, offers new badge rewards. Is it over for Gowalla?

Published on June 8, 2010 in Facebook, Foursquare, Google, business, mobile, social media and technology. View Comments

Back in March I wrote a post about the battle for venue checkins between mobile location–based services Foursquare and Gowalla. Since then there have been some developments that certainly point to the rise and rise of Foursquare.

Since then Foursquare has been busy courting local businesses and partnering with a growing number of bigger brands. It has followed in Twitter’s footsteps in trying to become a platform by launching an App Gallery. In addition, a couple of weeks ago Foursquare announced that it was starting to reach close to a million checkins a day.

Now Foursquare founder Dennis Crowley has gone and landed himself on the cover of Wired UK, although Josh Williams from Gowalla is also featured in the article within.

Wired cover

Click on the image to go to Dennis Crowley’s Flickr stream for the back story, ‘So this happened. (Wired UK, July 2010)’.

In addition, Mashable, one of the world’s most popular blogs, is partnering with Foursquare to give Foursquare users tips and recommendations on social media venues, tech gatherings, startup headquarters and some of their own dining picks.

Last year in a CNN post, Next year’s Twitter? It’s Foursquare, Mashable’s founder Pete Cashmore argued that Foursquare was already aligning itself to become a mainstream hit in 2010. His post alone would have done no end of good for the service, and now this.

Furthermore, at the Mashable Media Summit, it was revealed that Foursquare is fast-approaching 1.6 million members and is now experimenting with CNN Cup badges. The new badges are a move towards addressing “badge fatigue” by attempting to add more value to badges.  For example, once a badge is unlocked it will guarantee the holder priority entrance into specific parties and events. It’s the equivalent of a VIP program.

foursquare_trend

Above is a Google Trends comparison between the search terms ‘Foursquare’ and ‘Gowalla’ over the past 12 months. It’s based on the average search traffic of each search term. This doesn’t reflect user growth, but I think it certainly gives a good indication of the buzz surrounding Foursquare, which you’d have to agree is a big factor in encouraging users to at least try the service. What’s clear is that there is certainly no shortage of interest. Foursquare is going from strength to strength.

As Business Insider points out, the battle may now be between Foursquare and bigger companies such as Facebook, Google and Twitter. Do you agree or disagree? Still sticking with Gowalla?

About negative comments appearing on BP station venues in Foursquare

Published on June 3, 2010 in Foursquare, business, environment, mobile, politics and social media. View Comments

Frankly, in light of the ongoing Gulf oil spill, I’m surprised there aren’t even more negative comments like this appearing on BP station venues on Foursquare. Maybe there are in the US, especially around the Gulf Coast?

BP

And as you’d expect, there are a LOT on Twitter. “Oil Spill” has been in and out of (mostly in)  Trending Topics for over a month. This is what happens in social media when The Gulf Between Greenwashed Image and Reality becomes blatantly obvious.

bp

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