Open up your mind and say, ahh...

The rage in social networks right now is Pinterest, partly because it’s probably the first social network that has a much higher adoption rate by females than males, and partly because it’s an interesting concept: somewhere between visual social bookmarking and scrapbooking. What also might not be immediately obvious is that it’s just “easier” to interact there. In that way, Pinterest has something in common with Instagram, which is community around photos.

What I’m interested in, though, is Gentlemint, which I keep calling “Pinterest for dudes.” (Again, because Pinterest has a very high level of female users, the content that flows by my screen there, most often, is female-focused.) I’m not at all interested in the technology. Frankly, Pinterest works much better. I’m not interested in the longevity. Pinterest has millions and millions of users. Gentlemint is still cozy. Here’s why I think it’s interesting: because it’s very targeted content curation where the network effect isn’t the goal.

Part 6 in a series introducing my new book, The End of Business as Usual…

The state of social media is no insignificant affair. Nor is it a conversation relegated to a niche contingent of experts and gurus. Social media is pervasive and it is transforming how people find and share information and how they connect and collaborate with one another. I say that as if I’m removed from the media and cultural (r)evolution that is digital socioeconomics. But in reality, I’m part of it just like everyone else. You and I both know however, that’ I’m not saying anything you don’t already know.

Social media is clearly becoming the new normal. For the last several years, simply adding the word “social” in front of anything and everything from media and gaming to commerce and CRM to business and consumerism, it’s clear that we are finally approaching the end of the hype curve to start making sense of what it all means and just how far it applies to the future of business and media.

But as social media becomes part of our cultural fabric and even as we witness businesses, governments, sports teams, and almost every organization socialize communication efforts today, much of what we see is merely the beginning of something that will one day become something far more important than the medium itself. Indeed, social media is affecting behavior and nothing is more important than the ability to influence decisions and ultimately behavior. The state of social media is not necessarily as much about which network is #winning as much as it is about how people are spending their time, interacting and connecting with one another, and what happens as a result.

To demonstrate this point, let’s review the profound findings from the recently released Nielsen Social Media Report.

1) Skeptics will now be recognized as laggards as they now officially stand in the way of progress. According to Nielsen, and well, reality, social media isn’t a fad. The report opens with a key finding that social networks and blogs dominate how Americans spend their time online, which accounts for nearly 25% of their total time spent on the Internet.

2) Four out of five active internet users aka everyday people visit social networks.

3) Looking beyond the U.S., in 10 major global markets, social networks and blogs reach over 75% of active Internet users.

4) 60 percent of people who use three or more digital means of research for product purchases learned about a specific brand or retailer from a social networking site. And, 48% of these consumers responded to a retailer’s offer posted on Facebook or Twitter.

5) 70 percent of active online adult social networkers shop online.

6) 53 percent of active adult social networkers follow a brand.

7) Tumblr nearly tripled its audience from just one year ago.

As a brand, Nielsen’s report gives us both validation and insight into the importance of social media in the business mix. But just who’s driving the growth? Understanding the demographics and also psychographics of social media users will help us more effectively connect our brand story to the needs and behavior of the social consumer. Nielsen reminds us that women make up the majority of visitors to social networks and blogs. The 18-34 segment boasts the highest concentration of active visitors among all age groups. Americans aged 35-49 are avid visitors as well as they are 4% more likely than average consumers to visit social networks and blogs than they do any other site. We’ve also learned in previous reports that Boomers are also flocking to social networks, with the adoption of social networks such as Facebook by the over 50 contingent growing by over 88%.

As I’ve long maintained, Facebook is the homepage for the social Web of the most progressive businesses. According to Pingdom, with 800 million users, Facebook is now the size of the entire Internet in 2004. And, as Nielsen shows us, at 53.5%, Facebook accounts for the majority of total time spent online.

Of course, social media is only part of the story. How consumers access the Internet and social networks alike counts for everything. As you can see, 37% of people access social networks from their mobile phone. Social networks aside, if your business isn’t creating dedicated online experiences for mobile devices, you’re missing a tremendous opportunity to connect with consumers.

Consumer activity is focused squarely on social networking in addition to accessing music, Web browsing, and GPS functionality. Engagement through content and 1:1 interaction is critical in earning relevance and attention in a new era of consumerism.

Social networking apps are up a whopping 30% from third quarter 2010. At the top of the list is Facebook with mobile usage dominated by 25-34 year-olds at 29% followed equally by those 18-24 and 35-44 at 20%. Access to social networks from mobile phones is up significantly among older demographics from just last year. Mobile usage among those over 55 jumped by 109% and those 35-54 grew by 68%.

Those active within social networks wield far greater influence offline than their more traditional counterparts. While we understand that consumers trust the recommendations of their peers, research by NM Incite reveals that 60% of social media users review products and services and is also their preferred source for information about the products they too consider. As you can see above, their effects are also felt offline. 33% are more likely to share their opinion on TV programs. 75% are more likely to be heavy spenders on music. Almost 50% are likely to spend significantly on clothing, shoes, and accessories.

Over the years, I’ve researched the gap that exists between what businesses think consumers want in social networks and what it is that they really want or expect. As you can imagine, there’s a significant delta between each and here, Nielsen delved a bit deeper to share insights into specific brand-related behavior by consumers in social networks. Much of their time is spent in pre-commerce phase of decision making, reading consumer feedback and learning about products. At the point of the decision, they seek to obtain coupons and promotions. Post commerce, they’re actively posting positive or negative feedback, thus influencing the decisions of others.

The dominance of social networking isn’t relegated to the United States, it is indeed a global phenomenon…and a way of digital life. Nielsen discovered that social networks and blogs are the top online destination accounting for the majority of time spent online, reaching at least 60% of active Internet users in the following countries:

1. Australia
2. Brazil
3. France
4. Germany
5. Italy
6. Japan
7. Spain
8. Switzerland
9. U.S.
10. U.K.

The End of Social Media 1.0

Social media is approaching a much needed maturity cycle where each word “social” and “Media” will no longer unite as an oxymoron, but instead as a true statement in how businesses and customers connect online. As a disruptor to everyday business, social media is forcing us to rethink everything. It is in many ways just like starting over. We are relearning and questioning everything and that’s the way it’s supposed to be. From creative and messaging to execution and measurement to service and loyalty, we now must look at applying more sophisticated and meaningful programs that combine social and media into a powerful form of engagement and leadership.

We will one day soon realize the day when “social” becomes part of the everyday construct in how people talk to one another and how we collaborate to solve for whatever brings us together. In the mean time, socializing media is only half as important as improving relationships and experiences within digital landscapes.

What do you think is different about today…what makes this the end of business as usual?

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Image Credit: Shutterstock

Already using Google+? Follow Mashable News for the latest about the platform’s new features, tips and tricks as well as our top social media and technology updates.

The Social Analyst is a column by Mashable Editor-at-Large Ben Parr, where he digs into social media trends and how they are affecting companies in the space. You can follow the author on Twitter and Google+.

Give credit to Google: Its strategic and orchestrated launch of Google+ has been nearly flawless.

Early reviews were positive but reserved, thanks to Google’s failure with Google Buzz. Like clockwork though, technology celebrities like Robert Scoble and Kevin Rose starting flooding Google’s social network and singing its praises. Taking a cue from Gmail, Google released invites in small bursts, sparking a clamor for invites across the web.

The result of Google’s carefully planned campaign is an estimated user base of 10 million in just two weeks. More importantly, engagement on Google+ is extremely high, with many reporting they get more responses on Google+ than they do on Twitter or Facebook. It’s clear that Google+ has momentum.

That’s nice, but the momentum is starting to blind Google+ users and the press to reality. Here’s the truth: Google+ is dominated almost entirely by early adopters. And early adopters, while important, are not great predictors of the success of a social network.

Let’s take a trip down memory lane and revisit some social media services that have been embraced by early adopters. What has happened to them and what it might mean for the future of Google+?

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The Technology Adoption Lifecycle

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Image courtesy of Wikipedia, NatebaileyMany of you have probably heard of the technology adoption lifecycle and Rogers’ bell curve. It is a sociological model developed in the 1950s to predict the normal distribution of technology adoption. Innovators and early adopters make up the first 16% of any given population that accepts a new technology. They are more risk-oriented, tend to be community leaders and aren’t afraid to try new things. However, that still leaves 84% of the population to adopt a new technology.

Let’s put these percentages in the context of Facebook and Google+. Zuckerberg said last week that he believes Facebook has hit critical mass. He also announced that Facebook has 750 million users. For the sake of argument, let’s assume that’s the potential market for the adoption of a social media service. If we do the math, that means that the first 120 million users are early adopters for social networking. That’s a long way from the current 10 million.

Whether you agree with my math or not, it’s clear that Google+ is dominated by an early-adopter crowd. Only early-adopter crowds could make Robert Scoble, Leo Laporte and Kevin Rose among the top ten most popular users on Google+. I even have a term for this phenomenon: The Robert Scoble Effect.

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A History of Early Adoption

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There’s nothing wrong with early adopters — you need them to test and evangelize your products. Every product starts with early adopters, though some start with a different crowd than others (remember, Facebook started out as a social network for college students).

However, early adopters shouldn’t be used as an indication that a technology product is destined for success. Let’s look at what has happened to a couple of technology products that either are or were once hot with the early adopter community:

FriendFeed: In 2008 and 2009, FriendFeed was all the rage. Its real-time stream and long comment threads were the precursors to the technology now standard on Facebook and Google+. The tech press wrote about it constantly, predicting that it would beat out the competition.

FriendFeed gained a cult-like following, but it never broke out into the mainstream. In 2009, Facebook acquired FriendFeed for $50 million. It was a nice exit, but with companies like Groupon and Zynga filing for IPOs that could be worth more than $20 billion, FriendFeed never turned early adopters into a mainstream audience.

Quora: At the end of last year, nobody could shut up about Quora, the social Q&A startup co-founded by former Facebook CTO Adam D’Angelo. It was in the middle of a perfect storm.

Since then, discussion of Quora has dropped off tremendously, and so has usage of the Q&A site. Follower growth has stalled since May. It also suffers from the Robert Scoble Effect, as the technology enthusiast is still Quora’s most followed user.

Let’s be clear: it’s still too early to make a final judgment on Quora, but the Q&A site is a good example of the fickleness of early adopters.

Twitter: On the other hand, Twitter is a good example of how an early adopter product can go mainstream. Twitter was dominated by early adopters for the longest time. It wasn’t until Ashton Kutcher, Oprah and Shaq joined that the social media service’s growth shot to the moon.

Now Twitter users generate more than 200 million tweets per day, and its most popular users aren’t Robert Scoble or Kevin Rose: it’s Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber and Barack Obama.

Buzz: Let’s not forget that Google launched a social product last year, one that received a ton of accolades. We all know how that turned out.

Image courtesy A. Stiffler

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Google+ Hasn’t Truly Been Tested

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Let’s be clear: We’re not trying to predict the future of Google+ after just two weeks of use. Overall, we like Google+ and think it brings some new ideas to the table. In fact, we’ve been surprised by the engagement we’ve received on Google+ thus far.

Still, all of this can be attributed to the early adopter effect. Is your mom using Google+? Is your sister using Google+? Have your friends in finance or medicine joined the Google+ revolution yet? We bet the answer is a resounding “no” in the vast majority of cases. At least your grandma has heard of Facebook.

So while Google+ may be riding a tidal wave of momentum at the moment, it’s still a toy of the early adopter. And until it can prove that it has a place in a world dominated by more mainstream networks, we suggest not abandoning your Facebook profile just yet.

Over the years, social networks have lured us from the confines of our existing realities into a new genre of digital domains that not only captivated us, but fostered the creation of new realities. As George Bernard Shaw observed, “Life is not about finding yourself, life is about creating yourself.” Such is true for social networks and the digital persona and resulting experiences we create and cultivate. It was the beginning of the shift in behavior toward an era of digital extroversion, self-defined by varying degrees of sharing, connections, and engagement.

On Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, et al., we were attracted by the promise of reigniting forgotten relationships and enamored by the sparking of new connections. These relationships evolved into our social graphs and ultimately our interest graphs and forever changing how we discover, share, and learn. We are now the architects of our own experiences, forever changing the information super highway and the paths for connecting people, information, and events. In doing so, we literally make the world a much smaller place.

With each new connection we wove, we were compelled to share details about ourselves that we might not have divulged in real life. And the more we exposed who we were, our aspirations, our hopes, and our challenges, the more we rewarded with responses and requests for new connections. The distance between what was, what is, and what will be, was then defined by what we share, who we know, and what we consume. In social media, we are measured by our actions and our words as well as who we know.

Our concerns of privacy or the lack thereof, now require education. We shed the semblance of privacy in order to unlock a new sense of digital freedom. Indeed, we are the last generation to know privacy as it was and is now something that has to be taught in order to cast digital shadows that unlock opportunities rather than close doors.

The Social Genome

The activity that defines the social web is as diverse as the personalities of its inhabitants. We are driven for many reasons to share and interact online and the motivation for doing so, changes with circumstances, intentions, and experiences. I call this behaviorgraphics.

The social landscape is populated by individual presences, but charted by its connections and how in turn, they move information between them. These conduits represent the opportunities for brands and media to participate in and steer the sharing of useful and mutually beneficial content.  Much in the same way that people align through diverse behavior, Forrester research tracks how this behavior factors into the adoption of social technology.

Two and a half years ago, Forrester introduced Social Technographics. To this day, it’s widely regarded in its ability to help us understand the need to create targeted content designed for the groups of individuals who each process information differently. As social media moves across the adoption bell curve from the left to the right and also from the edge to the center, we see that individuals within each of the categories shift in usage, both up and down.

This year, we learn something new about the way individuals are embracing, using, and ignoring certain designs and intentions of social networks. Social networks, for the most part, are still on the rise with “Joiners,” those who maintain a profile on a social network, growing by 8% since the last Social Technographics report was published.

Contrary to this growth, content-based networks, those that require users to create content, have seen no substantial growth since last year.  In the U.S., only 10% of online consumers actually upload videos for example. These “creators” though, represent the elite group who power social content within these networks and it is their content that is consumed and shared within multiple networks. And, the audience for their content is only growing with 68% currently defining the “Spectator” group, 19% in the “Collector” category and 33% commenting their way to “Critics.” Most markets around the world saw an increase in “Spectators” and this is likely to continue.

The 3C’s, Consumption, Creation, and Curation

Bucking the trend of growth in the “creator” category, Twitter, for instance, grew by 30 million users in the last few months.  Twitter isn’t so much driven by pure creation as it is rich with a combination of curation and consumption. And, while the services require its users to “create” content, doing so within 140 character doesn’t constitute creation in the same way a blog, YouTube, or Flickr account demand. It’s worth noting however, that creators still account for almost 41 million US online adults.

According to Forrester Consumer Insight Analyst Jackie Anderson, “The initial wave of consumers using social technologies in the US has halted. Companies will now need to devise strategies to extend social applications past the early mavens. This means that it’s necessary to understand how consumers in a target audience use social media.”

I recently conducted a survey with Vocus to understand the qualities that equate to influence and the characteristics that define an influencer. The number one reason we found that consumers follow or Like an individual or brand is the consistent creation of compelling content. I believe that it is the discovery and consumption of compelling content that helps individuals shift from consumption to assume a contributing role of curator…a meaningful step before creator. Curation drives a significant volume of Tweets and it is also curation that balances the art and science of engagement between creation and conversation.

Businesses must join the elite and integrate the creation of compelling content into the social marketing mix. Doing so gives consumers reason to share, expanding the role of curator within the 3C’s of Content and earning authority and influence in the process. I highly advise Forrester to introduce the Curator into the next version of its Social Technographics Ladder.

An Audience with an Audience with an Audience

According to Forrester Research, overall adoption of social technologies has effectively reached saturation. 80% of people in the US engage with social media, which is equal to the number of people who text via SMS or  equivalent to the ubiquity of those who own DVD players.

While it’s new, its value is not to be minimized. Social media users already number in the hundreds of millions, providing the reach of traditional media but also the precision of one-to-one service and attention. Forrester notes that just a handful of “Mass Connectors” will create 256 billion influence impressions in the US this year.

As our social graphs propagate, the information that passes within it also multiplies. Individuals are not only socializing, they are sharing information and creating content. In doing so, updates serve as social objects, becoming catalysts for increased interaction and overall reach. As a result, participants and their social presences are amplified within existing social graphs and now also extend across a rising category of nicheworks or interest graphs – social graphs united around common interests and themes.

We are the architects of our own experiences and we are also the hubs of relevant content, resembling production foremen as we develop workflows and processes for consuming, curating, and creating content.

As sociologist Robin Dunbar once theorized, we are limited to the number of meaningful relationships we can manage as human beings. That number is estimated between 130 – 150. The average number of friends maintained on Facebook today is 130. Coincidence? I don’t think so. The numbers are consistent across other social networks. Today, MySpace users connect with an average number of 107 individuals and on Twitter, the number is 77 (today). I believe these numbers are only going to grow.

I call this “Social Graph Theory.” There’s a reason why Twitter recommends people “like” you and Facebook also suggests “recommended friends.” The networks realize that as your networks both grow and contextualize, your presence increases exponentially in value and they can sell against it. Social Graph Theory suggests that the size of our social graph will grow year over year, leaving behind Dunbar’s number and establishing a new genre of relationships (strong ties), relations (purposeful ties) and associations (weak or temporary ties).

As you’re presented with like-minded individuals and at the same time, as your organic friend requests escalate as a result of everyday social networking, the size and shape of social and interest graphs will only expand. You will spend more time adding than subtracting…until you have to. With every new node that defines our social network, we increase value beyond just the host networks. Brands realize that by connecting with the right people, their presence and value proposition can also rise with the tide.

Forrester groups social catalysts in two categories…

Mass Connectors: Those who create a great number of impressions about brands and services in social networks such as Twitter and Facebook

Mass Mavens: Individuals who create and share content about products and services in other social channels such as YouTube, blogs, forums, or ratings and review sites.

Indeed, a minority of social media users, defined as the elite influencers, drive the majority of the conversations across the social Web.

For brands and businesses looking to engage in social media, a unique understanding of the “egosystem” is not open for discussion. The 5th P of the marketing mix is crystal clear. People account for everything here and businesses must recognize the channels for influence as well as identify the influential voices leading conversations and steering decisions. The next step is to develop engagement programs that activate the various roles of the social consumers and empower them with useful and beneficial content and incentives to convert conversations into clicks to action.

Image Credit: Shutterstock – edited

It makes sense that a company called General Electric would be bullish on cars with cords. But even by that standard the company is diving into the deep end with what it says will be the biggest order ever placed for electric vehicles.

Of course, almost any order would be the biggest order, but CEO Jeffrey Immelt isn’t screwing around. Speaking in London yesterday, he said GE will order “tens of thousands” of electric vehicles in about a week, a move that is sure to jump-start the nascent EV market as automakers like Nissan and General Motors bring the cars to showrooms later this year.

The plan makes sense for several reasons.

First and foremost, General Electric builds the equipment that provides one-third of the world’s electricity, so of course it will do everything possible to promote the technology. GE is moving quickly into the EV space, building charging stations and working with A123 Systems to develop batteries. According to Bloomberg, Immelt says about half of the company’s sales force of 45,000 employees will drive electric vehicles. That will go a long way toward raising public awareness of the technology. And don’t forget that GE Capital has a vehicle leasing division.

“GE has been one of the biggest players in this game and certainly has a lot to gain from the electric vehicle,” Brett Smith, a vehicle technology analyst at the Center for Automotive Research, told Bloomberg. “They’ve really truly tried to push this hard to get things going, and it seems to be a core corporate value.”

Immelt didn’t outline a timeline for when the purchases would be made, nor did he identify which manufacturer(s) would receive the order. Our money is on Renault-Nissan.

Here’s why:

GE and Better Place recently announced a “technology and financing partnership” to develop public charging infrastructure and accelerate the adoption of electric vehicles, especially by corporate fleets. Better Place, a Silicon Valley startup founded by Shai Agassi, plans to roll out charging infrastructure and battery swap stations in Israel and elsewhere — and Renault is its partner in that endeavor.

Better Place and Renault signed a deal last year to put 100,000 EVs on the road in Israel and Denmark by 2016. Better Place also has been using converted Nissan Rogues to show off its battery-swap technology in Tokyo.

It’s worth noting that GE’s partnership with Better Place includes a plan to develop a mechanism for financing batteries — beginning with a pilot program to finance 10,000 batteries in Israel and Denmark. Who’s currently building the only car with a swappable battery? You guessed it — Renault. That car, the Fluence Z.E., is being tested in Israel.

General Electric and Nissan also are working together to develop so-called “smart charging.”

What’s more, Renault-Nissan is, at this point, the only company with the capacity to fill GE’s order. Renault-Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn has made it clear he believes electrics are the future, and he is positioning the two automakers to lead the market.

Renault has at least three EVs in the works and Ghosn has said it will have the capacity to build 200,000 EVs annually by 2015. Nissan’s Leaf arrives at the end of this year and will be followed by an electric Infiniti in 2013. Nissan says it has the capacity to build 50,000 Leafs worldwide next year and will increase that to 500,000 worldwide by the end of 2013.

That isn’t to say GE won’t be buying some Chevrolet Volts or Ford Transit Connect Electric delivery vans or perhaps even some Codas or Teslas. But it sure looks like there are going to be a lot of electric Nissans and Renaults in GE parking lots before long.

Photo: Renault. The Renault Fluence Z.E. rolling in Paris.

Are you playing FourSquare? Are you “going out” with Gowalla? Are you looped in with Loopt?

Location-based services are once again changing the face of social networking. Where relationships were once at the center of user experience, in the Golden Triangle of mobile, social, and real-time interaction, “places” take center stage and corresponding  activities and rewards become the cast and crew of the production.

What started as a way to literally see and be seen, has now transformed into a universe where physical and online activity merge to improve experiences and relationships between people and also between people and businesses, services, and locales. We were lured into “checking in” through gaming and game theory. We earn points and badges for adding locations, checking into them, and also adding tips for other related activities worth consideration. But since then, the resulting culture and behavior emerging within these networks have rapidly matured into a microcosm powered by the 4C’s of commerce, connections, community, and content.

In a recent post by Marshall Kirkpatrick for ReadWriteWeb, he reviewed the top reasons why people check in to location networks. To summarize:

- Finding people
- Chance meetups
- Badges/Points/Gifts
- Special offers and coupons
- Local tips/discovery
- People tracking
- Personal history/Diary

I would add one more. Whether it’s said or simply a subconscious act, it is the essence of social networking universally. People check in as a form of social currency and the resulting capital and the value we place on it is different network by network. As such, it governs how we interact with objects and one another and also defines our net worth based on how we earn, spend, lose, and build capital.

As in Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and blogs, individuals are earning prominence through the tireless acts of earning visibility and community through interaction, content creation, and the establishment of goodwill by investing in the experiences of others.

The State of Local Social Networking

Facebook touts registered user numbers in the neighborhood of 500 million and Twitter claims over 100 million. However, with the amount of media attention given to FourSquare especially, one might expect a higher network of users, especially when local service providers are concerned. As of today, Foursquare boasts roughly 2 million users and Gowalla checks-in with somewhere around 350,000.

If you want to get an idea about the future of technology and society, pay attention to the left side of the adoption bell curve. It’s less about how many people are networking via LBS today and more about what it means for people and businesses at the local level and how the 4C’s become the hub for bridging digital and offline social economics.

Robert J. Moore, CEO of RJMetrics recently studied data related to FourSquare and Gowalla and published his research in TechCrunch.

FourSquare is acquiring new users at an impressive clip, averaging almost 13,000 new users per day over the last 30 days while Gowalla’s user acquisition rate hovered at one-tenth the growth with 1,370 users per day. Perhaps most compelling is FourSquare’s average daily growth rate, the number of new users in a given day divided by the total user population from the previous day. When compared to Gowalla, FourSquare is averaging a daily growth rate of 75%.

Location-based networks are measured by users and also by the number of venues contained within the system and the velocity of its expansion. At the moment FourSquare boasts 5.6 millions venues with Gowalla housing 1.4 million.

In most social networks as well as mobile networking, women rule. However, in Foursquare, 64% of users are male, 33% are female and 3% did not specify gender.

The Business of Checking-In

Local services are realizing, albeit slowly, that increasing visibility in the real world, on the traditional Web and now the social web, is an effective way of competing for attention where it is focused. Foot traffic, Yellow Pages, Google and Yahoo Search are losing favor to new forms of research and referrals. Yelp paved the way for social reviews and referrals, but Foursquare and the like are introducing trusted opinions and real-life networking into the mix that reward exploration and experimentation. Businesses can only benefit by playing along.

However, on Foursquare, 18% of the venues have at least one “tip” associated with them. Only 3% offer “specials.” 32% of listed venues have been checked into only once or never. Across FourSquare and Gowalla, the most popular venue names include:

- Home
- Subway
- Starbucks
- McDonalds
- Burger King
- Walgreens

Not only are businesses competing for the moment, they are also competing for the future. And with limited resources, identifying where to focus time and energy is paramount. What took Twitter some time to formally embrace, FourSquare is realizing that businesses, in addition to everyday users, are the beneficiaries of check-ins. As such, Foursquare is concentrating marketing and development resources to helping businesses compete for check-ins through specials, loyalty programs, campaigns, promotions, and events.

Businesses, if you read one thing in this post, CLAIM your business on Foursquare right now and read a bit about how to make the most of the service to increase your customer-base as well as increase loyalty among existing customers by introducing new and fun engagement programs.

Foursquare recommends offering:

- Mayor specials
- Check-in specials
- Frequency-based specials
- Wildcard specials
- Loyalty programs
- Variable ranges for nearby offers
- Tips

These offers and lures carry across the mobile and social experience, extending your brand across social graphs on Facebook and Twitter through iPhone, Android, and Blackberry phones.

Foursquare also offers real-time venue stats for business owners to gather insight into their new “digital” consumers and spark creativity in campaigns and service programs. For now, available information includes:

- Most recent visitors
- Most frequent visitors
- Times of day for check-ins
- Number of unique visitors
- Histogram of daily check-ins
- Gender
- Check-ins also broadcast to Twitter and Facebook

As The Brand Builder Olivier Blanchard asks, do you know who the mayor of your business is?

Making the Business Case

Foursquare provides window clings, as does Yelp and other services, to attract passerby’s. For example, Hampton Inn and Suites (below) and Whole Foods are among the many businesses proudly displaying the ability to check-in “here.”

While effective, this is only one of the ways a business can leveragey location-based social networks for customer acquisition and retention.

Here are a few examples as collected from around the web.

The Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) partnered with FourSquare to encourage transit ridership

Starbucks offered $1 off any size Frappuccino for mayors and as a result, observed a 50% increase in check-ins at its locations.

Monique’s Chocolates in Palo Alto acquired over 50 new customers and earned over 100 redemption for it’s special of “buy one get one” for truffles. Each redemption also equal a 25% return ration. In comparison, the chocolate shop ran an ad in a local paper and acquired only one new customer at a cost of $300.

AJ Bombers, a popular burger joint in Milwaukee increased menu item purchases by 30% through its special promotions of free burgers for mayors and free cookies for adding tips. Also demonstrating creativity, AJ Bombers hosted the equivalent of a Tweetup for customers to help them earn Swarm and I’m on a Boat badges while increasing loyalty and sales.

Using Gowalla, the New York Nets hids free pairs of virtual game tickets throughout sports-related check in spots. These tickets could be exchanged for real game tickets as well as other prizes.

Through Gowalla, the Courier Journal, Kentucky’s largest newspaper hosted a city tour and bar crawl during the Kentucky Derby where visitors earned special badges for following the guided tour.

While these examples represent only a few of the many ingenious and viral ways to attract and reward customers, the true promise of these portable social networks is the ability to bring to life online and offline relationships and experiences to unlock a city’s true treasures. Business owners, the question is, have you checked in?

By Brian Solis: www.briansolis.com

Image credit: ShutterStock

And if you find it difficult to follow the slides, you will find the deck Posted in LikeMinds, Social Communications, account planning, adaptation, adoption, social media, society | Tagged adoption, brandbuilder, exeter, integration, Kevin Smith, like minds, LikeMinds, objectives, olivier blanchard, pr, Red Chair, Social Communications, social media, strategy, Tiger Woods, Toyota, VAIO, video | 1 Comment

One Response

1. Hey Olivier

   People can actually watch the video with the slides on the side on our own Insights Platform!

   http://insights.wearelikeminds.com/olivier-blanchard-on-social-media-integration/

   Was due to release yesterday, but got a bug in the system, and the guys at CSJ must’ve seen the page in Google.

   Cheers
   S