Location-based social services like Foursquare and Gowalla are taking steps to reduce the number of ‘Mayors’ who have gained their status unfairly.  Users of these services are bestowed the honor of Mayor, or other impressive-sounding titles, for having the most visits to a specific venue or business.   For some Mayors, this status entitles them to exclusive privileges like immediate seating at a restaurant.

Many venues, however, are reluctant to offer financial-related rewards like store credit or significant discounts because some Mayors have illegitimately won their mayorship by falsely claiming to check-in to a venue when really they are sitting at home on the couch.  Without the serious financial rewards, usage of location-based services will be hard pressed to grow beyond the early adopters.

To counter this problem, Foursquare has recently released a revoke feature that enables venue owners the ability to take away a users mayorship if they are an employee, or for ‘other reasons.’   It’s these ‘other reasons’ (i.e. false check-ins, or cheating) that pose the biggest challenge to the growth of location-based services.

The revoke feature is a good first step, but may not be the best long-term solution.  Store owners are already pressed for time running their businesses.  Do they really want another thing to do – revoking mayors?    In addition, the act of revoking a customer’s mayorship could put the owner in a contentious situation with that customer.  Imagine the PR problems caused by all the negative YouTube responses from shunned overlords stripped of their status.

A better solution might be one that is more automated and relieves the venue owner from having to get directly involved in the dirty work of revoking their mayors.  One proposed solution is GPS technology.  When the user submits a check-in, their phone sends the GPS coordinates with the check-in data to validate if the user is actually at the location. GPS is limited mostly to outdoor areas; however, GPS signals are hampered indoors, like in malls.

Another approach, as previously pointed out by Devin in his post, “Shopkick A model for stronger substantiation of location,” is to transmit an inaudible noise that is received by the Shopkick app running on the user’s phone.  This is a step closer to fully securing check-ins, but also has limitations.  Aside from annoying every dog that walks by, this approach does not allow means to track if someone has reached a precise point in space.  This may not be a big deal now, but does limit future location-based applications.  I also wonder if the ShopKick technology allows for multiple check-in points at a single venue.  

I do agree with ShopKick’s approach in that I believe the best solution for securing the check-in process  is by placing the check-in validation mechanism, typically hardware, at the physical location.   It needs to be a two part system:  the user brings one part into the venue, like a key of some sort, to match it up with the other part residing at the location.   Check-ins only occur when these two parts meet.  Right now, users can complete the check-in process from anywhere using an app on their phone.  There is no connection to the physical location.

The user needs to ‘do something’ at the location to get credit for their check-in.   One action could be requiring the user to  swipe an RFID tag over an internet-connected RFID reader.   Venue owners could pass out inexpensive RFID tags to their customers.  The customers register their tags online to gain access to VIP services at the venue.  The RFID tag contains a unique ID that is assigned to the user. Later, once Near Field Communications (NFC) gets implemented into all smart-phones, we can remove the RFID tag from the process and the user simply swipes their phone.   It only takes a few seconds to swipe, it’s automated, and the venue owner doesn’t have to do anything.  Most importantly, the check-in process becomes legitimized, which opens the door to more robust location-based mobile services .

Services like Foursquare have the potential to become a viable platform for commerce that can provide venue owners with what they need most – foot traffic.   The investment required to purchase RFID readers and tags is very  small in comparison to the potential payoff.

For those unfamiliar with Groupon, it is essentially an email marketing offer that consumers can opt-in to receive a daily email highlighting a product or service, usually from a local company, at a heavily discounted rate (between 35% and 85% off the regular price). I have participated in Groupon a few times, opting to purchase for myself and as a gift. Some examples of products/services include; Massage/salon services, flowers and home décor, and food and drink.

With 218,000+ “likes” on Facebook and offering deals in more than 150 cities across the nation, founder and CEO Andrew Mason has created a way to bring buyers and sellers together to offer an unbeatable deal. Groupon claims that they have “saved consumers more than $300 million dollars to date and has generated millions in revenue for the business it features.” (http://www.crunchbase.com/company/groupon)

from www.compete.com

Don’t tell that to Jessie Burke, a coffeeshop owner in Portland, OR. She almost saw her business go under because of Groupon. According to Burke, Groupon sold customers a $13 credit for the coffeeshop for $6, and then sought to keep the entire $6. Eventually, Groupon and Burke ended up settling on a 50/50 split and each got $3 from each purchase. Groupon’s $3 was nearly pure profit, but the coffeeshop had to use that $3 to cover $13 worth of food and drink. (http://blog.redfin.com/blog/2010/09/groupons_success_disaster.html) With over $1000 groupons sold for the promotion, the Groupons took a financial toll on Burke’s bottom line. The pitch that Groupon sold in was that the amazing deal would attract new customers and then would result in repeat business. According to Burke, that was not the case. “Over the six months that the Groupon is valid, we met many, many wonderful new customers, and were so happy to have them join the Posies family. At the same time we met many, many terrible Groupon customers… customers that didn’t follow the Groupon rules and used multiple Groupons for single transactions, and argued with you about it with disgusted looks on their faces or who tipped based on what they owed.”

On 9/15/10, Groupon Atlanta offered a daily deal for Donna Dawes Photography. The deal was a 1 hour photo shoot, and 8”x10” print, a DVD of the images, and 20% off additional prints for $65 (approx $500 value) WOW! That deal seemed too good to be true, and as it turned out, it most definitely was. In the discussion thread that Groupon offers on the site, a user noticed that upon visiting the website of the photographer, she had been promoting her work with stolen images from other photographers and over-promising to deliver services that would be too difficult for a small company to carry out. Users became suspicious as to how a small photography shop would be able to handle the over 2,000 Groupons and a barrage of comments began flooding the discussion boards. The deal was eventually pulled and customers were refunded their money.

Sentiment before 9/1

Sentiment graph 9/1-9/17

Tag Cloud - Keywords before 9/1

Tag Cloud - Keywords After 9/1

You can see with the graphs and tag clouds on the left that there has been an increase in negative sentiment towards Groupon since the start of September. We can attribute this negativity to the issues seen over the past 2 weeks.

This calls into question whether Groupon should enforce limits when deals like this are unreasonable, which is currently on the onus of the merchant. (http://techcrunch.com/2010/09/16/groupon-photography/) Groupon states that they offer merchants to cap the deal, but when a small business like Posie’s and Donna Dawes Photography are sold in on the opportunity to gain hundreds (if not thousands) of new customers, the temptation can be too great. The question then becomes, “Should Groupon be more diligent about screening out deals offered by small businesses, or should that ultimately be the responsibility of the business owner? We will watch closely as this story continues to evolve. Let us know what you think.

Update: You can read Groupon’s response here: http://groublogpon.com/cities/too-much-of-a-good-thing/

Perhaps it’s because most people truly are good people (that’s another question all together), maybe people just like to look smart, more likely it’s because when you have a passion you want to share that passion.  But the bottom line may be even simpler: because we can!

We can share.  We can share information, knowledge, ideas, and anything else we can think to share.

So skipping ahead quite a bit in the evolution of the internet to today; Facebook and Twitter are the current best examples of this concept of sharing.

So what does all this have to do with SEO?  Search engines have always wanted to give their users (you doing a search) the best possible results.  They’ve always struggled (and are constantly tweaking) to figure out the optimal way to determine the VERY subjective decision of “best”.   What they have figured out is that they certainly aren’t the only one who should decide this answer, and maybe not even the best to decide.  We are.  And since we can’t tell Google directly what we like best – at least not every single one of us can, all at once; Google has figured out a way to get that answer without us telling them.  How?  By learning what we share.  What we find enough value in that we’re willing to risk our reputation as a trusted friend, colleague or family member to say – I like this, you may like it too.  Most of us don’t take this lightly.

What do we link to?  What do we post on Facebook?  What do we Tweet about?  What do we comment about on other’s blogs?  What blogs do we subscribe to?

So have I lost you again?  What does this have to do with SEO?

Everything.

As I sat in session after session on a variety of topics of best practices, tips and guidelines for better search marketing it was ultimately all SEO.  It was all to improve SEO.  Even if most people don’t recognize that.

Why do we work so hard to create great content?  So people will like it.  Why do we want them to like it? So they’ll share it.

Why do we tweet about our products, latest news and sales?  So people will know about it.  What will people do if they find something they like?  They’ll share it.

Why do we update our Facebook status – sometimes entirely too often?  Because we want to share with people.

Why do we do press releases?  So people will know about our latest news.  What do reporters do when they have noteworthy news – they share it – it’s their job.

Why do we do PPC?  So more people will come to our site – the more people that come to our site the more chances someone will share our site with someone else.

Why do we put Like, Tweet, Digg and Share This buttons on every page of our website?  Well, if you don’t know by now I’m done.

So for the last time: What does this have to do with SEO?  I think you’ve figured out.  If everything we do on our websites (even off our websites) is so people will share it and a hugely important factor (although obviously not everything – there is no SEO magic bullet) for search rankings is how popular we are, and that popularity is determined in large part by how often others share us, the math is simple.  It’s all about SEO.

We’ve been given the extreme opportunity to actually talk with our community

From my vantage point we, as marketers, need to embrace what it is we’ve been given… We’ve been given the extreme opportunity to actually talk with our community, converse with our customers, and build solid relationships that, if nurtured correctly, can turn into passionate advocates about our company, brand and products. This amazing phenomena doesn’t come without a pricetag. Not a monetary figure but one of time, understanding, and effort. We must pay this price to build the trust needed to develop lasting relationships and bonds that will only continue to grow stronger with each interaction.

Now that many companies are “dipping a toe” in social media, we continually hear, “How do I build trust within my community?”

eMarketer recently released some amazing facts and figures about what and how people trust in social media.

As we see above, trust from consumers depends on several variables; some that you may have control of, some that you may not. There is no magic charm for success in social media; however there is a simple formula to building passionate supporters:

1.    Build Trust
2.    Drive Loyalty
3.    Empower Advocates

As more and more business are adopting Foursquare as a marketing channel by adding incentives for checking-in, the need to track and analyze this data has resulted in the launch of a Foursquare dashboard.  In order to use this dashboard, you must claim your venue. You do not have to be the person that created the venue to claim it, but you must be available at the venue to answer a phone call from Fourquare and provide details/proof that you are eligible to manage it. You can either manage the account through your personal Foursquare account, or start a new one, as the details of the manager’s account are public.

This dashboard is a collection of venue check-in analytics including stats like:

Key Metrics: (Overview of activity)

- Total check-ins
- Unique visitors
- Percentage of check-ins shared with Twitter
- Percentage of check-ins shared with Facebook
- Gender percentages of check-ins

Top 3 Visitors

12 Most Recent Check-ins

All Check-ins (detailed list)

Time Breakdown (time users are checking in)

See Below:

Currently, there is no way to access the information by a certain week, month, or day, so for now, we are forced to record this data and move into a spreadsheet or other tracking software.

This is a great step in the right direction for a business using Foursquare. We anxiously await more detailed tracking options from Foursquare in the near future.

The Pew Research Center recently published a research paper titled “The Future of Social Relations.” In it there are some great facts and insight in how individuals are reacting to the impact that the social environment has had on their lives and the effect it will have in the coming decade. Some of the results are quite outstanding.

One of the most astounding outcomes of the research is the positive sentiment that social networking has had on our lives and relationships:

Some 85% agreed with the statement:

“In 2020, when I look at the big picture and consider my personal friendships, marriage and other relationships, I see that the internet has mostly been a positive force on my social world. And this will only grow more true in the future.

So what does this mean to brands? Simple; in social media, relationships matter. We may all get caught up in scale, community size, impressions, reach, and the bottom line for our brand, but the only thing that matters to me as a consumer, is the relationship you build with me. I don’t care about any of those things, I only care about what value you bring to my life.

Let’s take this amazing study about how social media has had a positive effect on our relationships as individuals and use it as a wake-up call. Social networking isn’t marketing; it’s a lifelong commitment to building a relationship with individuals.

By mapping out different customer journeys, we can better understand the experience of our social ecosystem from the consumer’s perspective; compounding the effects of any single campaign or message.  The true power of social media comes from the complete integration with two things:

The entirety of our other marketing – Communicating a consistent message across all touchpoints will only expound the message to ensure brand awareness, understanding, and expectations within the marketplace.

The day to day lifestyle of our customers – Understanding where, how, and why our consumers communicate, then communicating with them on their terms, taking them to the most relevant information for them as a customer or prospect will create a sense of trust and understanding between the customer and the brand.

Creating a holistic and a granular view of our customer journeys in the digital space, we can better serve our customers by providing more relevant information as well as better plan our marketing strategies to increase ROI in the digital space.

Now here’s the question… Chances are your brand(s) advertise on Google based on keyword searches… Everyone does it simply because of the targeted nature of search and the expanse of reach that Google provides. It’s a no brainer, go where the consumers are. But what now; Now that the consumers are shifting to Facebook? We should be on Facebook. It seems like another no brainer right? Are you on Facebook?

Now I’m sure if you’re not on Facebook, the thought of it frightens you. The small loss of control, the conversations that people are having, and actual interaction with the customer can all be very intimidating, even to the most seasoned marketer. So much so, many companies are staying away from the platform and social media all together. It’s new and hard to define. We have no idea what will happen in the social space. However, we should know what we’re missing.

Enter the second article… In the article “Social Fans More Likely to Buy,” eMarketer points out reasons people become fans of brands on Facebook and the driving forces for them to purchase. As we can see in the graph below, Social Fans are very likely to not only purchase from the brands they are “Fans” of but also recommend those brands creating a level of trust, word of mouth, and earned media that static platforms like Google cannot offer.

So now you’re probably asking, “why would anyone become a “Fan” of my brand on Facebook?” Simple… it makes their life easier and more involved. As we see from the second graph the top reasons for “Fanning” a brand are:

•    To receive discounts and promotions (become a more empowered consumer)
•    I am a customer of the company (show loyalty and enhance advocacy)
•    To show others that I like/support the brand (allow your brand attributes to define them as a person/customer)

It’s an amazing shift in why people become a fan of a brand, but shows the realization of individualized, personal marketing that a platform, like Facebook could allow.

If you’re a marketer of a brand, your goal is to get your brand in front of as many eyes that you can, as well as persuade toward a purchase. Google may give you an opportunity for the reach and allow you to display an advertisement, but Facebook offers you much, much more. It not only gives you the eyes you want and the advertising you desire, but also provides you with a platform to interact with customers and communicate on a regular, semi-intimate basis; to give them discounts and promotions; to enhance loyalty and build advocacy; and provide an outlet to let your passionate followers shout to the world that they are your customer. It’s a simple thought… communicating with your customers. One that should NEVER be scary.