FourSquare: You Should Be Paying Attention
You probably haven't been able to avoid the buzz about Foursquare, one of a couple of new geo-location microblogging social media outlets that are starting to make some noise out there. Internet fads come and go, but Foursquare is something small businesses really need to pay close attention to.
It's a Game?
Foursquare has game elements that make it fun and sticky:
- Points: Users earn points for checking in, going to multiple locations, and a variety of other things.
- Badges: Users earn badges along the way -- badges they display on their user account page. The full list of badges is a lot of fun, and the desire to earn badges will motivate many users.
- Titles: Whomever has the most checkins in a given location is the Mayor, something users will compete for pretty fiercely.
Automated Word of Mouth
So, what good does that do for small business? The important thing to know is that foursquare connects to user's facebook and twitter accounts. When a user checks in, an announcement goes out to those who follow her on Foursquare, and to her facebook and twitter accounts. And that means a whole lot of social media word of mouth marketing in each checkin.
And, this can be made even easier for your customers by displaying a QR-Code block. Users with an Android smartphone that can run the Scanner app will be able to simply scan the graphic with the camera in their phone and check in that way.
What Should I do?
This is something that you need to come up with on your own, but here are a few places to start:
- Rewards. Think about ways to reward customers -- either for their first checkin or for being Mayor. It doesn't need to be a lot -- if you're a coffee shop, a free cup of coffee for the Mayor once per day is a good idea. Anything easy and inexpensive that you can offer that will make the Mayor feel special will go a long way.
- Tips. Anyone can post tips for a specific location, and you should definitely be paying attention to the tips that are posted about your business. Also, depending upon your business, you may be able to use tips to deliver your own messages. Think of these tips like the sort of yard signs that roofers and contractors will post at houses where they are doing work -- are there locations in your city that your products or services are on display, where you could draw attention to them with tips in Foursquare?
- Custom Business tools. Foursquare has recently allowed businesses to "own" their own space in Foursquare. Their approval process is bogged down at the moment, so the process may take a few weeks, but the potential for this sort of development is huge, and it's a good idea to dig in to this. Why not create a badge that your customers can earn? Find out more at Foursquare's Businesses page.
Foursquare is still pretty new, but it's getting a lot of attention lately, and that's only going to grow. There's a way to leverage it, in an interesting way, for your business. What might it be?
