So, everyone’s been gagging to know my thoughts on location-based social media – it seems to come up in conversation on a regular basis.  To be honest, I really didn’t see the value until my recent trip to Austin for South by Southwest.  Austin is very Wifi and digital-orientated to begin with, so you can imagine having thousands of iPhone-carrying digital media folk makes for a very vivid experience of with location-based social media would be like should it become ‘mainstream.’

What Is It?

So, what is location-based social media?  It is essential taking a platform like Facebook – where you have friends you can share information and tips with – and takes it down to a very localised level, e.g. specific businesses and establishments.  Here’s the typical experience for a new location-based social media user:

• User creates an account, then adds friends who are also on the network.
• Next time user visits a cafe, museum, coffeeshop, airport… (s)he “checks-in.”
  • The app shows tips on what’s good and what’s not.
  • The app shows you your other friends who are there (or are nearby).
  • Advertisers can potentially send you special offers [we'll cover that in a minute].
• Your friends can see where you are and come join you.
• As you check-in more often, you can accumulate points and badges (”Jetsetter,” “Adventurer,” and “Explorer” are some of mine).
• The person who is the most regular visitor to an establishment can be crowned ‘Mayor’ – which many places are rewarding this virtual crown with real-world benefits.

As for the applications themselves, the two leaders in this space right now are Gowalla and Foursquare.

What Does it Mean for Small Business?

The reason this is important for small businesses is two-fold:

Location-based services allow customers to self-identify themselves as a patron of your establishment – and allow you to target them correspondingly.

Translation:  You can reward people for good social media behaviour.  Here are a few examples:

• Users can receive a free __________ on their 5th/6th/10th check-in.
• Foursquare Mayors get ______________ on every visit.
• Check in on your first Foursquare visit and get __% off your meal.

The application allows you to verify this kind of information – the user just shows you their phone – so it’s easy to track. Lots of businesses are offering this service to drive repeat business, and I think if you choose your offering properly, it can be a very cost effective marketing tool.

Location-based services are exactly that – location based – which offer a new paradigm of advertising that is targeted with laser focus.

Translation: You can serve someone an advertisement right when they are looking for it.  Here are a few examples:

• User checks-in to popular restaurant in town.  Cupcake van across the street highlights a special for you to stop by and sample if the restaurant doesn’t have dessert you like.
• The walking tour operator highlights last minute deals for those who have checked-in to the cafe nearby, politely mentioning the staff will put your coffee in a takeaway cup if you want.
• Patrons to the hotel bar are offered coupons for stopping into the restaurant for a meal. (I almost said something about offering them a room for the night.  Ooops – I guess it depends on what kind of hotel you run.)

Here’s an example of one of the special offers that was served to me when I checked in to one of my favourite coffee shops in Austin:

The chocolate place is just around the corner – who wouldn’t want a nice chocolate to go with the freshly brewed coffee they just ordered?  This is damn smart advertising.  Wow.

Where’s This All Headed?

I often have an open mind on such things, but for location-based social media, I’m pretty clear:  the only way this will work mainstream is if there is a dominant player.  Consider if there were three or four Tripadvisors in the world, or five Yelps – very different scenario than what we have now, right?

So for Gowalla and Foursquare, I think it’s a race to gain market share.  I’m not sure if they can make it, because more than likely either Facebook or Google will do one of two things:  build a competitive product, or buy them.  These  networks just don’t offer any value without big numbers.  As I sit here in Edinburgh writing this, these tools offer me as a consumer no value. There aren’t that many people, there aren’t any special offers, and few establishments have any reviews or tips….

If you’ve been scanning this whole time, read this part…

For now, small businesses should spend some time right now doing the following:

• Claim your profile listing on the networks so you can make sure the details are correct.  VERY IMPORTANT!
• Monitor what is said about you.  Yes, I’m afraid that the whole problem of everyone is a reviewer just got larger – and more personal.
• Investigate how large of a portion of their target market is using these apps. (Easiest way to find out is ask.)  Big enough portion to start doing some promotional efforts?

For many of you, the answer will be “nobody is on there, but I’m keeping an eye on it.”  For some, it will be “ooh – look at all these new potential customers.”  And for those of you in places like Austin, it will be “Oh my – this is where the party is!”

To Learn More

Need help crafting your ideal travel online marketing strategy or tweaking what you’ve got, location-based or otherwise?  We can help!  Be sure to have a look at all of the online marketing strategy resources we have – including DIY guides, simple but effective worksheets, and coaching.

Photo by William Hook

This article is part of our series on Lessons Learned at South by Southwest 2010, a popular technology conference.

The Idea of a Sustainable Community

The idea presented was about how sustainability should be part of your business – almost the ultimate goal.  It is a hard concept to describe, but it’s crystal clear by example:  Harley Davidson.  The panelist pointed out that if Harley Davidson closed tomorrow and no longer made motorcycles, the biking community would continue to exist.

It’s a great example, but I can’t figure out if this works for travel communities or not.  A couple of examples:

• Tour Operators:  Sure, all that local info or niche information will still be valuable and relevant for some time, but would people still want to gather in a place where the tour providers have gone?
• Travel Blogs:  Without that fresh content and discussion to trigger new thoughts and ideas, would the community die?

Perhaps I’m trying to compare apples and oranges, but it seems like this might be a difficult one if you haven’t planned it out well.

Ideas for Sustainability

Some thoughts I had on making a travel community more sustainable:

• Creating community embassadors (and highlighting them) – the smaller your team the more important this is.  Get as many of your staff as possible involved.
• Relentless focus on community members themselves.  Yes, you must talk about the company as you’re here for business not just pleasure, but when community members know they’re valued they’ll be prepared for the long haul.
• Make sure you’re focused on the big picture.  The community isn’t just about buying your stuff.  It’s about sharing ideas and enthusiasm for the particular topic or niche you cover.

To Learn More

If you’re worried about how sustainable your community is, we can help.  Why not take our free business assessment and get back on track.

Photo by mindfulness

This article is part of our series on Lessons Learned at South by Southwest 2010, a popular technology conference.

At SXSW, some of the most amazing conversations one can have isn’t in a panel or a keynote, but it’s in a hallway or over dinner with those people you’ve made connections with.  One of the connections I made was with my good friends Deb Ng and Chris Garrett, two people I’ve known for a long time but never managed to meet in person until now.  We had an excellent conversation over burritos about building and maintaining an online community, and I wanted to share three of those points here.

They Don’t Owe You Anything

The topic came up of a particular small business owner that said, regarding their community, “they never did anything for me.”  If you’re trying to build something around your brand and you go into it expecting them to do something for you just because you setup this community, you’re in for a hash reality.  Your community doesn’t owe you anything – so don’t be ungrateful.  Give them so much value you they can’t help but give you something back.

Cultivate, Don’t Churn

You know what they say about customers:  it’s easier and cheaper to make more money from an existing/previous customer than to try to find a new one.  It’s true about building a community too; it really is easier and less expensive to cultivate the people you already have, rather than just churn through people as quickly as possible.

You aren’t running a fast food restaurant (I hope).  Give people a reason to stick around and come back for more.

You Have to Give to Get

The lesson that I shared in our learning from pop music came up again:  you have to give if you want to get.  That’s just how the universe works.  Give, give, and give some more.  No matter what you get back, give more.  Sooner or later, you’ll be rewarded.  I promise.

To Learn More

Building a community is fun and  rewarding, but it’s also hard work.  Be sure to visit our resources area to learn about other products and services that can help you help your community.

photo by daveness

Google Buzz – a new social networking product integrated into Google’s GMail email software – was released to the general public a couple of weeks ago.  My GMail has only recently been ‘buzzed’ so I’ve sort of been watching to see what others have had to say.  After the major disappointment of Google wave, it seems Google has tried a little harder this time.  But maybe not hard enough.

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Two pieces of online technology news has grabbed the attention of small businesses worldwide in the last few days:

• the first is that Google is willing to acquire Yelp (a massive business ratings and reviews website, if you aren’t familiar with it), although the site has just rejected an offer of $500.000.000 dollars.
• the second is that the Mountain View Giant will re-launch Google Answers (which was shut down about 3 years ago) and rename the service “Google Guru”!

These events may be tagged as being just another of the huge amount of acquisitions that Google has pursued in the last few years, which, interestingly enough, have followed the market trends: 16 in 2007 (an incredibly vibrant year for the web) and only 2 in 2008, the year of the recession.

It may be looked at as the launch of another service, but in fact there’s something very interesting behind this business deal.

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Did you hear about our new free small business assessment?

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If you’ve been following the trending topics on the social networks, then you’re mostly likely aware of Google’s latest product innovation, Google Wave.  Google touts Wave as our next major communication tool, a revolutionary product as big as the telephone and television.  It isn’t just “the next email product,” but Google instead says they’ve re-architected email from the bottom up.

Unfortunately, the product fails to deliver.  I think they’ve only managed to fix something that wasn’t broken.  Sure – email isn’t perfect.  But what might have been nice is if the Google Wave team had bothered to discuss what business owners need in a communication tool, and build that instead.

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A brief note to share a very interesting slidepack from our good friend Katrina Greeves at World Nomads.  This was her presentation from the Adventure & Backpacker Industry Conference 2009, held in Australia.

Katrina had asked us for examples of small businesses in travel and tourism who had found success online – and we didn’t have to look far, as our free do-it-yourself guide 7 Common Mistakes Businesses Make Online is full of them!  Katrina loved the story about Deneki (and so did we), but there are a few other great examples to flip through in this short but useful slideshow.
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LinkedIn has always been one of my favourite social media platforms because of it’s professional nature.  Because profiles are very CV or resume-like, it has made spam very non-existent here – a refreshing change from other platforms we know.

The site has made a few changes recently that are pretty important, or at least noteworthy of discussion.  Let’s take a closer look.
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I’ve had an opportunity to explore a new global distribution system (GDS) from Tourabout, an Australian company that currently offers an online portal where smaller operators can offer tours to a bigger pool of visitors, who use the Tourabout site to search and find holidays.  As you may know there are several companies doing exactly this, but I am very excited about Tourabout’s new product, which they call a social travel marketplace.

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