"Checking In" On Location-Based Marketing

So wouldn't it be cool if you could walk by a Starbucks and get a mobile coupon?  Haha, just kidding.  If you've been in the mobile space for a while, you know that has been the promise of location-based applications for nearly a decade.  While mobile coupons are starting to appear, they aren't quite making the splash that has been promised since data started being delivered to the phone.  But leave it to social networking to get things cranking around location-based services that are actually compelling, consumer friendly, and have real potential to be a serious marketing tool for businesses.  

With social networking becoming mainstream over the last few years, location-based services are gathering the most traction through social networking tools like Foursquare, Gowalla, and MyTown.  My early experiences with these services provide a sneak peek into how they have the potential to transform the loyalty program landscape.  Before, other than standard reward cards almost every establishment offers, McDonald's Monopoly game was one of the more inventive and fun loyalty programs.  But with restaurants beginning to offer discounts, no wait times, and even free vacations (Moby Dick's in the DC area had this running recently) for their Foursquare "Mayor", people are again incented to visit establishments to gather badges and mayorships to show off to their friends.  I must say I myself have been caught up in this when I see an establishment offering up freebies to frequent, um, checker-inners.  

While these services are just getting off the ground and have had some initial success (2MM users of Foursquare as of this post), there are a couple of key improvements I'd want to see happen from a product perspective:

• They need to enhance the anonymous social check-ins to enable real-life encounters and socializing.  Rather than simply checking in to alert your existing friends where you are and what no good activity you're up to, these apps should allow you to meet others, in real-time.  I recently checked into a coffee shop and noticed 3 others had checked-in as well in the last 15 minutes.  Being on the constant lookout to understand consumer behaviors, it would have been great to engage these somewhat early adopters themselves of location-based social networking, and generally just chat and meet new people with similar interests.  Why not enable an IM client within the Foursquare app so that I can ping someone at the same place as me to see if they are open to meeting?  Oh yeah the privacy thing.  Of course, you could control if people can IM you via your personal settings.  An even less intrusive way would be to have a socialize flag when you check-in at each location.  When you check-in, hit the flag if you are open to meeting others at the same place using the application.  These location-based applications can be a powerful method of meeting other like-minded people in person vs. simply exchanging friend requests online. 

• These services need to start incorporating auto-checkouts so that the retailer/restaurant knows how long someone has been at the establishment.  So many people walk down a sidewalk and simply check-in to every store they pass.  While these networks are clearly trying to leave things flexible to increase usage and early adoption of their services, at some point they will need to maintain their credibility and allow establishments to know exactly who their loyal fans are vs. people gaming the system.  This will ultimately help the establishment reward the right people, keep people using the service, and ultimately increase the revenue prospects for these social networks. 

Comments

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Hi, I'm going to the DC start up event in the business marketing category. I was wondering if you wanted to chat. I have some ideas for web and mobile apps.

Sean

iamthecountry@gmail.com

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