Foursquare is For … NOW!
There’s a new location-based trend in the here-to-stay world of online socializing sites. Sites like Gowalla and Foursquare lead the way about a year ago. Now Yelp (the foodie website) has added a “geo” element too. In the case of Foursquare, they’ve announced two affiliations in the last month that might be game-changers. They are now partnering with the Bravo network and with Zagat!
Stop.
What are you talking about?
Ok. Let’s start all over. In layman’s terms: Foursquare is a combination social network-gps locator-game that encourages one to “check-in” and leave “tips” when one is out and about. So let’s say, you’re going to the movies, or a bar, or a restaurant, or a museum – or anywhere, really – you open up the application and Foursquare will do a search for where you are. (Because it can locate you.) If your location doesn’t come up, you can type it in. Where it gets a bit fun and competitive is that one can become the mayor of a place or get points for checking in more times than anyone else in a given week or in a specific location. And yes, each check-in gets uploaded to your respective status update on Facebook or Twitter or both. If you’re on Facebook or Twitter, you’ve probably seen some updates.
Businesses get a free plug for doing, uh, nothing. But smart businesses – like Tasti D-Lite on the Upper East Side of NYC – have been offering discounts or free product to mayors or to others for just for checking in. This promotes guest visits and loyalty – and what restaurant doesn’t want that?
It’s a great site for cities because you can also see where your Foursquare friends have checked-in – and they may be around the corner. And now you can go join them.
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Here’s an informative video that breaks it down better than I do: How Foursquare helps consumers and businesses: http://slidesha.re/6e1NB0
If I owned a restaurant or a bar, I’d make sure I let all Foursquare types know that any check-in will be honored with a complimentary glass of wine or a draft beer or a dessert. As long as they showed their check-in.
For the record, since Christmas, I’ve been “out” 18 times, checked into 34 places and have been crowned the “Mayor” of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church and WordHampton Public Relations. (Um, these two mayoralties are pretty much a joke; I was experimenting with the site. Nonetheless, I AM the mayor of my church and my business. LOL!)
Here’s a brief description of Foursquare’s deal with Bravo taken from Gavin O’Malley at Media Post: “Foursquare offers entertainment brands an opportunity to interact with their customers on both a personal and local level,” said [Foursquare co-founder Dennis] Crowley. “By extending on-air, this partnership also allows us to reach beyond the tech-early-adopter crowd and introduce an entirely new audience to Foursquare.”
Bravo will create on-air spots that drive users to “check in” to Foursquare from various locations across the country that have been featured on Bravo series, as well as venues recommended by Bravo talent.
The network will offer a series of branded “badges” specifically designed around series that include “The Real Housewives,” “The Millionaire Matchmaker,” “Top Chef,” “Top Chef Masters” and “Shear Genius.”
But Foursquare didn’t stop at Bravo. Writing for Mashable.com, Jennifer Van Grove says,
“The New York Times is reporting that Foursquare has signed a deal with trusted restaurant review service Zagat. Zagat’s official Foursquare page is already live and includes official Zagat-rated tips and recommendations that users can add as to-dos to their Foursquare experience.
Zagat is calling the partnership “Foodie Love,” and there’s even a new accompanying foodie badge. Zagat.com is extending the partnership beyond Foursquare and starting a “Meet the Mayor” online interview series that will feature discussions with prominent Foursquare mayors.
Foursquare’s relationship with Zagat is clearly an answer to Yelp’s introduction of check-ins, especially given the trusted and prestigious nature of Zagat content.”
Oh. Foursquare is apparently this close to announcing partnerships with the History Channel, Warner Bros., HBO and Explore Chicago.
Guess it’s time we all started exploring Foursquare, eh?
Steve Haweeli is President at WordHampton Public Relations Inc. Contact Steve directly at steve@wordhampton.com or follow him on twitter @SteveHaweeli
His excuse was, “It wasn’t personal.”
Which made her react by demanding, “What is that supposed to mean? I am so sick of that. All that means is that it wasn’t personal to you. But it was personal to me. It’s “PERSONAL” to a lot of people. And what’s so wrong with being personal, anyway?”
“Uh…nothing,” he timidly backs down.
In triumph and in spite, she concludes, “Whatever else anything is, it ought to begin by being personal!”
The dialogue may be from the 1998 hit movie, “You’ve Got Mail,” but it applies most anywhere where business and personal issues struggle to co-exist. Of course, with the dawning of the digital age and the onslaught of virtual technologies that virtually and literally keep millions of addicted users in their bathrobes while blending both their personal lives with their business pursuits every day, there is hardly a difference anymore.
Just what is personal and not business? And what is business-only and not at all personal?
A few months ago, ESPN faced this issue after Ric Bucher, an ESPN NBA analyst, tweeted about how his company was treating Twitter (and all other social media interactions for all ESPN employees). The company’s policy was overwhelmingly restrictive, he claimed, especially since he had difficult separating his personal brand from that of the company. And who can blame him for that? Was he a sports expert before they hired him to be a sports expert or did the company make him into the sports expert he claimed to be? At the end of the day, who really cares? The company may have hired a sports expert, but what they got was a person. A whole person.
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Aside from the act of giving birth or gently succumbing to a natural death, I can think of nothing that doesn’t at least hint at one while appearing altogether entirely the other. And vice versa.
Which is both a dream and a nightmare for folks concerned with branding. Personal or otherwise, nothing is more engaging that an attractive brand. In the world of public relations, it’s easy to find examples of this. Unfortunately, in the rest of the world, it’s disturbingly easy to find good examples of bad branding just by reading the headline news.
And in these times of overlapping personal brand with business ideals, it’s important to start looking at the bundle. Because if you are a potential partner or a potential customer, you will likely want a sneak peek at the entire package before committing to anything worth keeping.
The good news is that there is a simple solution to overcome the obstacle of getting too personal. In business, in uneasy social settings, in life; the key is to remain authentic.
William Shakespeare said it best when he penned, “This above all: to thine own self be true.”
That said, here are a few rules for branding yourself in a world that doesn’t have a backspace.
1. Don’t lie.
2. Don’t be mean. Or stupid.
3. Don’t wear or say anything uncomfortable because you’ll regret it halfway through the evening and the discomfort will outweigh the benefit of putting on such a front.
4. Realize that you are human. Act human. Act humane. Make business personal.
5. When – not if – you screw up, admit it and move on. With a smile. Because even a half-assed smile is better than no smile at all.
Just ask Tiger Woods.
Jennifer Tofanelli writes jeniontherun.blogspot.com; a lifestyle blog on trendy topics, headline news and communication strategies. She offers advice and consultation to businesses, organizations and individuals on how to use social media to build relationships and deliver value. You can contact her direct to discuss freelance opportunities.
Have you ever walked into the middle of a conversation and suddenly had the awkward feeling that everyone was talking about you?
Motrin has. About a year ago, they became a trending topic on Twitter when Moms, one of their key customer groups, were talking about the insensitivity the company displayed in a recent ad campaign. The consumers summed up Motrin and its use of social media this way: “They don’t get it.”
One year later, we see Motrin exerting an active presence on Twitter and other social media sites and doggedly determined to become “Part of the Conversation” rather than the “Topic of It.” But just “Being” on social media does not necessarily mean you are “Doing it Right.”
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As someone who helps companies wade into the social media waters, but do it in a way that is authentic and in alignment with their brand, I have picked up on a few red flags that I would like to pass along. I call it:
The 5 Ways to Know if You’re Using Social Media Wrong
1) Your Twitter page reads like the CNN ticker. Social media is NOT the place to post your newsfeed! That has become a staple of many homepages, where it is ideal for SEO bots that are scouring the web for updates and new content. But social media is about interaction and one-to-one contact. Nothing says “impersonal faceless corporate entity” like following your favorite brand on Twitter and receiving the Tweet “Thanks for following us. For more information, visit our website.”
2) Your company Facebook friends are also your kids’ Facebook friends. Like any marketing initiative, social media campaigns should be targeting Quality over Quantity. With more than 370 million users, chances are that you have actual customers on Facebook. A simple step many companies overlook is the proactive promotion of their social media sites to gain targeted customers and build relationships with them. Do not let it become a web-based popularity contest where every fan, follower and contact is weighted equally.
3) Your Social Media Marketing is something you’ve assigned to the Interns. Successful marketing campaigns always stem from being integrated across the company. That requires buy-in from the top down! I get very nervous when an executive tells me the company is already on “MyFace” or “SpaceBook.” Too many execs think that new technology is beneath them and refuse to take the initiative in learning what it can do for their business.
4) It Doesn’t Seem Like Your Social Media Profile is “Doing Anything.” Although social media functions in areas like SEO and PR, it is, at heart, a marketing device. And somewhere along the lines, people have forgotten that marketing’s job is to create sales. Which means that social media should be attached to business objectives! That actually generate revenue! A strong advantage of social media over traditional marketing vehicles is its built-in trackability. There are great tools out there to set goals and determine ROI on any social media marketing efforts.
5) You tried social media and it didn’t work for you. I have heard more than my share of marketers explaining, “It detracted from our messaging” or “It’s not a good fit for us.” 9 out of 9 times, what they’re really saying is they didn’t like it or understand it, they didn’t integrate it into an overall marketing campaign and they got tired or bored of it after a few half-hearted attempts. My favorite is when I later find out that the boss’ 16-year-old niece put them on Facebook. I’ll be the first to admit that for many companies, a Facebook Fanpage makes zero sense–so don’t waste your time. But you are missing valuable customer insight if you are not monitoring these powerful online conversations. Effective use of social media, like traditional media campaigns, requires an intelligent strategy tied to real world objectives, executed consistently over a long period of time.
If these all made perfect sense to you, congratulations, you are among those who “Get it” in the new media environment. If any of these sound like you or your company, I would encourage you to re-evaluate what you are doing or who you’ve put in charge of it. Like so much in life, there is more to success than just “being there.”
Shawn Butler is a campaign strategist at Relevant Social Media based in Atlanta. You can contact him at Shawn@RelevantSocialMedia.com.
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by Amy Howell
People ask me daily about social media and it has been fun as well as challenging to try and figure it out, but that’s the whole point— nobody has it all figured out although there are a lot of smart people out there blogging and discussing issues. The thing I personally like about social media is that nobody “owns” it and there’s something there for everyone.
You cannot control the tides of social media, but you can control your corporate message and your strategy to tell your story—good or bad. You don’t have to look very far to find daily examples of how Twitter or You-Tube can impact a business in minutes. Recent stats report most businesses don’t use social media but plan to in 2010 (I have posted a lot of these articles on my Twitter page).
Here are some of the leading “Trends” of Social Media for this year (and I predict they will grow):
* Traditional Media and marketing has been revamped, replaced. Much of what we did to market and tell our stories within the last year has been crushed.
* Social Media corporate marketing budgets are on the rise.
* Retailers need to be savvy online; Customers researching and buying online. One word exemplifies this: Zappos (435 Zappos employees use Twitter!)
* The Recession is helping Social Media as a cost control alternative.
* News is 24/7 now, and customers won’t buy week old news.
* Well known bloggers and influencers on Twitter are getting every media message out.
* Lots of good applications and increasing technology tools like the iPhone will advance the Social Media cause.
In closing, I will tell you that if you feel overwhelmed or intimidated by social media, internet communications and all the applications that are out there, you should! Even for some of us practicing it daily, it is like nothing since the Industrial revolution.
Use of the internet will continue to grow and smart companies are looking now at how they can plug into the dynamic—and fascinating tools out there to turn the tides of social media to their benefit.
Amy Howell is the CEO at Howell Marketing Strategies, LLC. Follow Amy on twitter and read more blog articles by her here.
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by Deborah Brody
Ralph Waldo Emerson is often quoted as saying: “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.” Note that Emerson refers to foolish consistency. Smart consistency, on the other hand, should be adored by smart marketers and businesspeople everywhere. Smart consistency strengthens your brand and improves your marketing efforts.
With so many marketing platforms available, it’s easy for marketers to lose track of the message and image in their communications efforts. But consistency really is the key to effective marketing, making it a priority to be able control the message.
The most famous brands (think Coca-Cola) always are consistent. Their logo always looks the same, the tag line is the same and the general look and feel always follows the brand’s rules. Great brands enforce consistency.
Less established brands, especially struggling businesses, tend to do the exact opposite. They change up the logo, don’t respect or even have set colors or tag lines or fonts. One ad tells you one thing about the company and makes that a “brand attribute” while another touts something completely different.
Some businesses are experimenting with their marketing or simply don’t have the budget to hire a professional to caretake their branding efforts. A busy business-owner is probably too caught up in his/her other responsibilities to pay close attention to the marketing communications.
Marketing communications aim to shape perception. As a marketer, you want the public to come to accept and believe the image that you want to project. And what does an inconsistent message/look communicate? If it succeeds in communicating at all, inconsistent marketing shows a lack of direction, and in some cases, carelessness. Inconsistency can also communicate confusion and that muddles your branding.
How do you create and enforce consistency?
1) Make consistency a priority!
2) Name a point person to be the final authority on all communications. That person would ensure style and message are in sync with all other marketing efforts.
3) Create an organizational marketing style guide, and refer to it every single time you are putting out a message.
4) Train your people on your message. This is doubly important if several people handle your message, and especially on social media platforms like Twitter.
Yes, consistency will take enforcement and effort, but the result will be a stronger brand.
Deborah Brody established Deborah Brody Marketing Communications (www.deborahbrody.com) in 2002 to provide writing, blogging and strategic communications consulting services to small and medium sized businesses and nonprofits. After moving to Washington, DC from Miami nearly five years ago, she still misses Cuban coffee and random conversations in Spanish. Follow Deborah on twitter @DBMC
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