5 Ways to Use Foursquare to Market Your Location-Based Business
I’ve been mulling this around since posting the last Foursquare article and thought that there were more practical tips could be added.
Foursquare is a hugely untapped and powerful little tool for business marketing, especially if you own a business that requires customers to physically visit your location to make a purchase. Unfortunately most businesses don’t understand just exactly how they can use Foursquare and are missing out on a fantastic and inexpensive marketing opportunity!!
So here are five very practical tips on how to use Foursquare to market your location-based business.
1. Use Foursquare like a customer loyalty card
The cool thing about Foursquare is it shows the user how many times they have been at each location, so you could offer customers a freebie after so many check ins. Make sure you set clear rules about how to redeem the offer including: check ins more than once per day do not count towards redemption of the free offer; or free offer value at $5.00, may not be accumulated or transferred, may not be redeemed for cash, etc.
The women’s clothing store Ann Taylor recently launched a Foursquare promotion like this in New York City giving shoppers 15% off at the store after their 5th check in and giving the person with the most check ins at one location (called the Mayor) 25% off their purchase at that visit.
Another company, Tasti D-Lite, offers frequent shoppers a branded Foursquare badge, as well as additional loyalty points on their physical loyalty card, plus freebies and other perks.
2. Organize a real-time treasure hunt.
Now this could get really fun. Leave a clue of the day on the “Tips” section of your Foursquare page with the answer to each clue being a different special of the day. The customers who come in and guess the special, get the special, plus they are eligible to win a bigger prize at the end of the contest.
Another company, Jimmy Choo, a high-end designer footwear brand, runs this contest by having a pair of Jimmy Choo sneakers check in at various hot spots around town. The person who is able to guess the next hot spot and arrive there before the Jimmy Choo shoes arrive will win a pair of very expensive shoes.
3. Use Foursquare to entice new customers to come into your store by offering a 1st Timers check in discount or freebie.
“Show us your check-in and your dessert is on us!” Again, make sure you communicate clearly in your offer what the rules are; i.e., free dessert is only for first check in, and must be redeemed with purchase of a meal; etc.”
4. Leverage word of mouth marketing.
One of the benefits of Foursquare is that friends can “follow” each other and thus can see each other’s check in’s on Foursquare. Note: The check in’s are also posted on Twitter, Facebook and Yelp, if they’ve enabled the function. This is huge for your business because every check in at your location is a tacit recommendation from the person checking in there. Leverage this exposure by inviting people to check in via Foursquare. Providing special offers for those who check in via Foursquare will invite people to check in more often.
Also, make sure you pay attention to what people are saying on Foursquare about your business, because whether you use it or not, people are using it, and chance are, they are talking about your business. Personally reply back to people who leave tips or make positive comments and thank them. Likewise, it’s just as important to respond to negative comments as well and to remedy the issue as soon as possible. Don’t be negative; just say something like, “I’m sorry that you had a bad experience. Let’s get it touch and discuss how we can make it up to you.”
5. Tie in text message marketing with Foursquare.
Invite people to take photos of them having fun or otherwise enjoying your location and text the photos to a special text message phone number. Once they do this they will have opted into your text message marketing program and you will be able to send them additional specials and discounts via text.
What other ways can you use Foursquare to market your high traffic location based business? I would love to hear your comments. Next post, how to market your non-location based business on Foursquare.
Wendy Kenney is a nationally known Buzz Building Expert and the Founder and CEO of 23 Kazoos, a marketing firm specializing in inexpensive and creative small business marketing strategies. She has honed her marketing skills through over 26 years of entrepreneurship and business management.
Wendy just released her new book called “How to Build Buzz for Your Biz- Tap into the Power of Social Media, Publicity and Relationship Marketing to Grow Your Business” based on her knowledge of what works and what does not work in small business marketing. This book features practical and low cost marketing strategies, such as “How to Grow Your Business Using Social Media,” as well as valuable links, resources, and tips and is available on Amazon.com.
Wendy frequently speaks to organizations about marketing for small business. To get more information or to schedule Wendy to speak go to: Business Marketing Speaker
Claim your free download (no email necessary) on Wendy’s website: 23 Kazoos
July 18th, 2010 at 9:44 am
Great topic Wendy! Using existing services like Foursquare or Gowalla is a cheaper and often better way of marketing for any small businesses - make that EVERY small business. Also makes for a great way to begin with mobile as opposed to building an app…
I personally like the way Gowalla leverages virtual goods instead of the “mayor” approach — makes for rewarding everyone a little easier. I just interviewed Sam Taggart from VaynerMedia about the way the New Jersey Nets leveraged Gowalla to increase fan support (http://untether.tv/ellb/?p=1615) and how everyone can use these tools in their businesses, large and small.
Whatever your business is, there is a service out there that you should be using to extend your business into the mobile world — regardless of your industry.
July 18th, 2010 at 12:00 pm
Hey, thanks for your comment! Foursquare is the more popular app, but I like Gowalla as well.
July 18th, 2010 at 12:07 pm
Hi Wendy,
It would be great to see hotels or organizers of conventions partnering with local Convention & Visitors Bureau’s. They could add more value to their convention (and drive higher attendance) by offering specials or discounts at local restaurants & businesses by showing their check-in at the conference through a partnership with CVB’s.
Maybe even get people to stay that 3rd or 4th day of the conference that always seems to suffer from low attendance, by offering a rebate on their registration fee if they do stay and can show a check-in at the last event the convention creates with FourSquare.
Best,
Chris
July 18th, 2010 at 4:56 pm
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July 18th, 2010 at 7:07 pm
Really interesting…Cannot wait for the next post!
July 18th, 2010 at 9:39 pm
Wendy,
You’re right that Foursquare has great untapped potential as a small / medium-sized business marketing tool.
Your point about Foursquare as a customer loyalty program is spot-on. I have put together step-by-step instructions on how to quickly create such a program via Foursquare here:
http://jackmonson.com/2010/06/28/how-to-create-a-customer-loyalty-program-via-social-media/
I would love to hear your thoughts.
Thanks,
Jack
@jackmonson
July 19th, 2010 at 12:37 am
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July 19th, 2010 at 5:32 pm
Just linked to your great article at http://www.socialmediateacher.us
Question you say “Note: The check in’s are also posted on Twitter, Facebook and Yelp, if they’ve enabled the function.” I thought Yelp adopted their own version of “check in”? You can get your Foursquare check ins to show up in Yelp? How do you do that?
July 19th, 2010 at 5:39 pm
Jerry,
Thanks for your comment. You can’t check into Yelp from Foursquare; yet. Although, you can check in from the Yelp app on the iPhone.
July 19th, 2010 at 8:26 pm
Great article Wendy! We’ve had a lot of great feedback from SMB’s who have taken the first step towards utilizing Foursquare as a bigger part of their strategy simply by integrating their customers’ tips and mayorships into their websites with our TurnSocial bar. People have told us it’s a good way to “ease” into the world of Foursquare, since the content they’re collecting already exists amongst their customers, plus it allows business owners to begin to embrace the service without diving in to the deep end of the pool (so to speak).
Thanks for sharing these great tips!
July 20th, 2010 at 10:58 am
Looking forward to the day where Foursquare offers businesses analytical information about who is checking in, how often and how to contact and reward the customers if customers choose to opt in to special offers and promotions.
July 20th, 2010 at 11:00 am
[...] story [...]
July 20th, 2010 at 1:55 pm
Great tips! We are also hearing from our users that they want deals for everyone and not just the Mayor. We call it “Beyond the Mayor” deals.
Josh
July 21st, 2010 at 11:53 am
Really great Foursquare tips, Wendy! I think what is crucial with small business adoption of social networking tools like Foursquare is their understanding of it. So many small businesses aren’t sure of how it works or how it could benefit their businesses, so they dismiss it completely (which is unfortunate).
Location-based services are also great for events. We used Foursquare for a promotion at a conference (details here: http://www.mitcharnowitz.com/2010/05/how_to_use_foursquare_for_a_conference.htm) and though that application is not quite foolproof, there’s enormous potential for events large and small. For instance, what if the organizers of a sidewalk sale involving several neighborhood businesses devised a Foursquare promotion, or if someone organized a Foursquare pub crawl?
July 21st, 2010 at 3:00 pm
Great info Kari! Thanks for sharing!!
Josh, would love to see an example of one of your “Beyond the Mayor” deals! Thanks!!
July 22nd, 2010 at 2:04 am
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August 2nd, 2010 at 11:49 am
Great topic and I personally love Gowalla. It has done wonders for our business locations. It’s so important for businesses to get involved with social networking these days. It’s a great way to get in front of your customers.
August 12th, 2010 at 2:11 pm
I had never heard of foursquare before, but for someone who has a retail location it seems like a cool computer tool. I wonder how it would work for a service based business that is mobile and doesn’t have an actual retail based location?
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January 13th, 2011 at 10:39 pm
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