What is Foursquare and How Can it Help My Business?

By OCI

Foursquare (http://foursquare.com) has been taking the world by storm over the past few months with its unique blend of social networking, status updates, business review and location based gaming. If you’re not familiar with it, Foursquare is an app that runs on your location aware mobile device. It allows its users to discover what’s around them in “the real world,” share their activity and location with their group of friends and compete with each other by earning points and unlocking badges. With Foursquare’s popularity comes a great opportunity for businesses to promote themselves to a new audience and a new way to reward their most loyal customers.

Here are the top 5 way a business can get started using Foursquare:

1. Offer Nearby
When a Foursquare user enters a business, one of the first things they will do, is “Check in” via the application on their mobile device. This does two things: 1. It alerts that user’s friends where they are and 2. It earns them points. At this point, you’re also declaring to Foursquare your exact location. Because of this, Foursquare offers a service that allows businesses that are nearby to promote themselves. If I run a café in a neighborhood I can set up a system that will send a message to anyone that checks into a local business and this message can (and should) include some kind of promotion. Something like “We noticed you just checked into Booky’s Bookstore down the street. When you’re done, stop by Cute Café for a free dessert with entree.”

2. First Check In
Foursquare also keeps track of how many times you’ve checked into a place. (On your first visit to a location you receive more points for discovering a new place.) To encourage new business, why not do a promotion that rewards people for their first check-in?

3. Mayor Discounts
Speaking of keeping track of how many times you’ve checked into a place, Foursquare also keeps track of who’s checked into a certain place the most. That person is deemed the Mayor. This creates some real excitement and competition among the players while at the same time keeping customers coming back to earn their mayorship. Why not encourage and promote this? I’ve seen several bars do this by offering to buy the mayor’s first beer on each visit. An incentive like that keeps other Foursquare users coming back to earn the mayorship and the mayor coming back to defend his title!

4. Discounts for Favorable Tips
When Foursquare users check in to a business they are also encouraged to leave a tip for other users. One thing to encourage lots of favorable tips is to offer an incentive, such as 10% off your bill if the Foursquare user shows the cashier that they just posted a favorable tip. It’s important to note as well that if businesses are participating in Foursquare they are also given the ability to post “Sponsor Tips” about their own venues or what to do in the area as well.

5. Sponsored Badges
Another great way to promote your business or brand is to sponsor a badge. As Foursquare users continue to use the site, they earn badges based on their activity. There are many badges built into the system already, but businesses can sponsor their own. As an example, let’s say you own a chain of ice cream parlors in your community. You could sponsor a badge that a user can only earn once they’ve checked in to each of your locations.

Foursquare has certainly changed the game for location based, social networking and with Yelp! and Facebook both trying to replicate what it has created, it’s pretty obvious this technology is here to stay. What’s great is it’s also a perfect way for many businesses to promote themselves. Choosing any or all of these options is going to help you create a very loyal and dedicated customer base and keep you ahead of the competition.

If you’re not using Foursquare yet, download it for: iPhone | Blackberry | Android | Palm