photo from D. Bjorn, Catchin’ Up
As mobility and location flourish, they bring with them constant innovations to better leverage the trends and technology that make them a hit with consumers. Below are two of the biggest new stories on the location front.
Starbucks has begun a national campaign to offer the mayors of their local stores $1 off a Frappuccino through June 28th. This move is particularly significant, as it is the first time Foursquare as partnered with a retailer for a large-scale campaign. When these mayors enter their local store, they unlock the Mayor Offer and receive a message alerting them to their discount. When the promotion ends June 28th, it will likely be replaced with another similar promotion, as Starbucks has said they would like to continue to reward loyal customers.
Twitter is currently rolling out a new location feature that automatically includes where you’re tweeting from in the text below your tweet. Instead of saying “8 minutes ago via Tweetie,” you can opt in to have it say “8 minutes ago via Tweetie from Plymouth, MN.” Though simple, it could add a lot of value to one’s tweet. Much as Bright Kite already shares the location of the pictures that you post, this would add context to your tweet about seeing whales on a tour or finding a local fireworks show. Perhaps the geo-location will become more exact in future iterations of the feature, so you can guide your friends to a particularly good corner at the parade or to the spot on the lake where the fish are really biting. Marketers that are considering or are already leveraging scavenger hunt-like contests can use the location feature as a further clue, or accounts like the Koji BBQ Cart can use their 140 characters to tweet the lunch special, rather than waste them on explaining today’s location. In the meantime, we’ll have to see what consumers make of the new feature, and see how it affects Foursquare and Gowalla behaviors and tweets.
Yelp has also thrown their hat into the ring, allowing users to check-in to restaurants and retailers and instantly write reviews. Users will then see where their friends are dining and be able to better distinguish what restaurants or clubs are really hopping and which may be dead on a Friday night.
Finally, Facebook will be launching a location feature by the end of May as well. It remains yet to be seen how this will affect current location app-leaders like Foursquare, but McDonald’s has already signed on board to test the feature, allowing users to check-in to the locations and share their purchases. It also raises an interesting question for marketers looking to geo-target, and adds a new competitor for Google’s currently wildly successful ad program.
Claire Grinton is a brand strategist and writer based in San Francisco. Find more from Claire or contact her at claire[dot]grinton[at]gmail.
Tags: Bright Kite, Facebook, foursquare, Gowalla, Location, Starbucks, Twitter, Yelp
For business, Twitter location and integration with other social networks is huge!
The fact that you control, via the map marker, what location you share and how close/specific it is to your actual real location is important.
[...] This is perhaps one of the most common ways establishments are making use of location. Brands like Starbucks , Anne Taylor and Gap have been using it to give special deals to customers who visit their [...]