Popular mobile check in application Gowalla today announced a new partnership with Walt Disney Parks and Resorts. The agreement will provide Gowalla users with custom Disney Gowalla pages, a collection of recent check ins and activities for specific parks and resorts, as well as hundreds of available custom Passport stamps, an image in recognition for checking in to a...
Source : VentureBeat
Explore : Cinema, Directors, NASA, Sciences, Technology
In a recent presentation I delivered on mobile location technology I touched on a number of examples of how social media fanatics can checkin and share their location information on social media streams like Twitter and facebook… although, as we all know, location technology is about much more than just the social check in! I [...]
Post originale: http://blog.gisuser.com/?p=8095
... comparison of six popular social location-based services (Foursquare, Facebook Places, Yelp, Gowalla, Twitter and Loopt). Location-based services can collect information about not only where we go but who we know, what we do, and who we are. If that information falls into the wrong hands, the consequences can range from embarrassing to chilling to downright dangerous. Robberies have...
Source : ACLU Bog of Rights
Explore : Cell Phone, Geolocation, GPS, Phone, Social Network
Screens from DCBID's Downtown LA SCVNGR Gift Hunt app taken by Callie Miller for LAist If all those late night Wurstküche Foursquare shout-outs and Staples Center Gowalla check-ins are beginning to feel passé, Downtown LA just got check-in worthy again. Downtown's Center Business Improvement District (DCBID) has launched a holiday scavenger hunt that highlights eight downtown locations. At...
Source : LAist
Explore : Cities and Towns, Los Angeles, Social Network, States, US
Pew Internet & American Life Project is out with its first report on the use of "geosocial" services - that is, mobile location-based services that allow users to "check in" to a particular venue and see which of their friends are nearby. According to the researchers' findings, only 4% of online adults are using a location-based app like Foursquare or Gowalla on their mobile phones. And on any given day, only 1% of Internet users have checked in.
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Does this news sound familiar? It should - it's the latest in a long line of independent reports finding the exact same thing: this "check-in" craze has not gone mainstream.
In case you missed the earlier news, here's a wrap-up:
Lest you thought that the trend was on the rise - Pew's data is a reality-check (assuming you buy it, of course). Like Forrester discovered earlier this year, Pew also found that usage of these "check-in" geosocial services is at 4% of U.S. online adults.
[Side note: We appreciate that Pew has given the check-in apps a new name: "geosocial" services. Forrester's report looked mainly at check-in apps, too, but insisted upon calling them "location-based services." That's confusing since technically, "location-based services" include a phone's "Maps" application or other commonly used apps that access your location to deliver things like local news, current movie showtimes, nearby attractions, etc. There's an increasing need to differentiate between an app used for "checking in" and an app that simply is location-aware.]
Pew's research data did uncover some other interesting findings as well. It confirmed that the demographic most involved with check-in applications is those aged 18-29 (8% usage rate), a group that's more "adult" than "teen." That's likely due to the fact that the majority of check-in apps still require a smartphone to work - a phone that's often pricier than a high-school student or their parents can afford. To compare, Forrester found that 70% of check-in app users were 19-35.
The new report also confirms that these services are still more popular with men than with women. 6% of online men use a check-in app like Foursquare, compared with only 3% of women. Forrester also found that check-in users were predominantly male (80% were male). This tells us two things: one, that there are a still a good many women out there with safety and privacy concerns regarding these services and two, that fewer women see the value in using these apps.
And do you target those women? Coupons, deals, and bargains. That's not a sexist statement - statistically, women are the bargain-hunters in the family. In Myxer's study for example, 28% of women between 35 and 54 were interested in mobile marketing initiatives compared with only 22% of men.
Another item of interest: Hispanics use check-in apps "significantly more" than other groups, with 10% usage among online adults compared with 5% of blacks and 3% of whites.
Although this report may appear to be bad news for geosocial service providers, it's important to note that just because check-in apps haven't gone mainstream yet, that doesn't mean they never will. Those who use check-in apps, while still the minority, are passionate about doing so. And even Forrester advised that marketers should take this quieter, ramping-up period as a time to experiment with the services.
As Pew mentioned in its report, there was a time when Twitter wasn't all that popular either - in August 2008, only 6% of adults used Twitter. Over the course of the past two years, that number has grown to 24%. Check-in apps may soon see a similar trend.
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Local search and business review service Yelp entered the location-based check-in game nearly a year ago, following in the footsteps of other services like Foursquare and Gowalla. Over the summer, the company added badges and mayor-like features and we wrote that the move clearly placed Yelp "in direct competition with the likes of Foursquare."
Now, Yelp is introducing Check-in Offers later this month, a feature that will give users real-life discounts and deals when they check-in to locations and it appears the company is following in Foursquares' footsteps again - but is it?
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A primary driving force for Foursquare users this whole time has been game mechanics - points for check-ins, badges, mayorships to flaunt just how much you go to the local dive bar - and real-life deals were added later as a way to both monetize and keep users checking in. Why continue checking in if all you get is a virtual badge, right?
Yelp, on the other hand, has long been in the game of local business reviews by community members. That's been its primary product all along. Check-ins, for Yelp, were more of a community building feature, something to keep users interested and interacting. As the company writes in yesterday's blog post announcing the feature, "Yelp is a transactional website, and upcoming features like Check-in Offers help to further bridge online discovery and offline buying. In other words no one types "Sushi" near "Los Angeles" for fun."
So, sure, Yelp may be literally following in Foursquare's footsteps with a similar feature, but it means something completely different in this context. Foursquare may offer "tips", but those same tips are the reviews at the very core of Yelp and it's why users go there.
We got a chance to speak with Stephanie Ichinose, the senior director of communications at Yelp, and she told us that mobile accounted for around 30% of Yelp's searches and that the site had just hit 14 million reviews over the weekend.
"It's an obvious and pretty natural extension," said Ichinose. "It absolutely makes sense for us to layer it in as a way business owners can communicate with their users."
And that might be the key difference here - at the heart of Yelp are businesses and those 14 million user-submitted reviews of those businesses. At the heart of Foursquare are locations of many kinds - businesses, hangout spots, random peoples' houses - some with reviews (or "tips") and some without.
Would these sorts of check-in deals bring you over from Foursquare to Yelp? Or is the user experience with Foursquare strong enough to keep you going, with the occasional deal or mayoral discount? Let us know if you think Yelp's implementation makes more sense or if it just works better with Foursquare in the comments below.
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Popular mobile check-in application Gowalla today announced it has launched several new features — all helping the company to make money from the service. The company’s new features include City Pages, Verified Businesses and a Stamp Calendar. Gowalla is now joining the competition, like Foursquare, by allowing businesses to claim and verify their locations. Once complete,...
Source : VentureBeat
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... has done many of these things and continues to innovate with new? funding and a growing staff. Gowalla is also going down this evolutionary path and staying true to many of the philosophies espoused in our last conversation . This has included user generated local ? highlights ?, and a more recent set of feature enhancements meant to entice both users and local merchants. Read the rest...
Source : Kelsey Group Blogs
It's no secret that both Foursquare and Gowalla are expanding their location-based social networks past the check-in, developing other incentives for consumers to use the services. Gowalla, in particular, has focused on adding innovative features to its platform to make the social network more interactive, through photos and comments. Most recently, the startup added local...
Source : TechCrunch
Explore : Internet, Social Network, TechCrunch, Technology, Web 2
��Gowalla users, or as I affectionately call them "The Others" will be pleased to know that Gowalla is actively pushing to compete with its recent partnership with Associated Press to bring the AP Top 25 Gowalla Check-In Challenge to students who check-in to certain college/university spots the most...
Source : Appscout.com
