Foursquare.com Ain’t Square, It’s Cool

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In one of my previous posts “Put The Local in Your Locale” I mentioned a relatively new social network called Foursquare.com.  I thought it had some real potential but unfortunately they were not in the Kansas City area.  After writing to them about my wish that they be here, my request was granted.  I just received word that along with several other cities, Kansas City is now on the map!

This kind of geo-targeted social network has real potential for those of you marketing to a consumer who is likely to purchase at your location.

Here are some of the features of Foursquare.com and then I would like to explore some potential applications to help you determine if it’s right for you.

Members of Foursquare.com check-in by logging onto the site from there mobile phone and letting their friends know where they are so they can come to that location.  Foursquare.com will also offer other locations nearby that may be places of interest to members.  Currently there are applications for IPhones and Android phones with a Blackberry application in the works.  There are also nice links to Twitter and Facebook.

Members have the ability to make recommendations of things to buy or enjoy at certain locations and Foursquare.com tracks how many times members frequent a particular location, based on the number of times they check-in.  Points are awarded for check-ins as well as bonus points for dragging friends along with you.  As points accumulate, badges can be unlocked, with the ultimate badge award being classified as a “mayor.”  Businesses can offer “mayors” certain privileges or freebies to entice them to come in as well as encouraging them to bring their network of friends.

Additional applications are being developed by Foursquare.com which includes an Inbound Ticketing system and a customer conversation community called “Get Satisfaction.”  For businesses that wish to actively participate there are plans available from $19 to $899 per month depending on reports, tracking, mayor offers and customization that is desired.

Applications for Foursquare.com

  • The obvious are restaurants and bars – mayors can be offered free drinks or appetizers once they check-in. Friends of mayors get special recognition. Weekly specials can be promoted through their customized site.
  • Museums – special shows and artists can be promoted and people can join as “friends of the museum.”
  • Sporting Events – not only can the events be promoted but businesses close by can benefit from online promotions to Foursquare.com members.
  • Non-profit Fundraising events – what a great way to encourage participation to those members who have a social awareness.  Mayors can receive special recognition by attracting the highest number of friends who also attend.  Companies that belong  to Foursquare.com receive some public relations exposure by being associated with a cause.
  • Gyms – hey it’s cool to be working out and even cooler when you can tell your network exactly where you are.
  • Bowling Alleys – Mayors that bring in a whole team can receive free food, drinks or a game.
  • Retail Outlets – clothing boutiques can take on an online personality and promote sales and specials. Foursquare.com members can talk about what they like about your place.

These are just a few potential applications.  I’m sure many of you can come up with several of your own.  That’s the beauty of this kind of network, it is really only limited by your imagination.

If you need to drive in-store sales, don’t be square and lose out on a great new marketing tool because Foursquare.com is very cool.

Let me know what thoughts you have.

Regards,

David

How’s Your Email Reputation?

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You remember that kid in High School who had the questionable reputation.  It didn’t matter what they said, how they dressed or the way they acted, once the bad reputation was there, it stuck.  It may have been a fair assessment of their behavior and it very well may have been completely false, but the fact that the reputation label was placed on them, right or wrong, it was theirs.

It’s really not all that different when we talk about email marketing.

I frequently talk to business owners who think their email marketing efforts are a failure.  They talk about low open rates and people unsubscribing.  They’ve purchased email lists specifically to market to and as expensive as those are, they have produced virtually nothing in sales.  “Email marketing just doesn’t work,” they say.

This despite the fact that an Epsilon Q1 2009 U.S. Email Trends and Benchmarks study shows that there was an increase in open rates for the 3rd quarter in a row, including a click rate increase of 4%.  According to Epsilon, “Email marketing continues to be an effective marketing vehicle.”

Fair or not, I believe these business owners are suffering from a bad reputation. According to Tim Roman of Fathom SEO, there are big changes coming that will shake up the email marketing industry.  And you need to understand that how you conduct yourself online can have a lasting impact on your reputation.

It’s really not accurate to pin a lack of sales from an email campaign specifically to a bad online reputation.  It requires a good deal more analysis to understand why email campaigns are not working, including the actual landing page experience, but for purposes of this post, I wanted to look at those actions that affect your reputation, and this is what the ISP’s (Internet Service Providers) will be evaluating when they decide whether they should even deliver your email or not.  Those same ISP’s are just as unforgiving as the High School students I mentioned earlier – once you’re labeled as bad, that’s pretty much it.

Many major ISP’s have adopted authentication schemes such as SPF to evaluate the deliverability of email.  IP address reputation is a major factor here.  Once these standards are universally used by all ISP’s, an email sender’s reputation will be known by all.

So what affects your reputation?

Dave Chaffey interviewed Tim Watson, Operations Director of SmartFOCUS Digital, an email marketing firm, about issues of reputation and deliverability.  Tim said that besides the sender’s reputation, technical setup issues, content and HTML could also contribute to deliverability problems, however reputation is the most important.  In Tim’s words, “Reputation issues are inevitably the result of poor targeting, lack of relevance and emailing too frequently.”

How do you address targeting and relevance?

  • Make sure you’re not using an old list, or one you have purchased from a third party where you don’t know whether the people on the list have opted in to receive your emails
  • Clean your list by doing a second request for opt-in.  This will reduce your list size but will insure that the recipients will likely not hit the “this is spam” button.
  • Ask your recipients how often they want to hear from you.
  • Segment your list and provide dynamic content that is appropriate to each group.  This requires really studying your list, their buying trends, and determining to which products or services your message should pertain.
  • Use feedback loops for spam complaints and even though they didn’t specifically opt out, remove any complainers from your list.  Windows Live (Hotmail) and Yahoo have launched these tools.

Take great care to preserve the integrity of your email reputation and it will serve you well.  By all means, make sure you do it before someone labels you as “bad.”

I’d love to hear your thoughts.

All my best to your success,

David