[In case you haven't noticed, I haven't had a lot of time to blog here lately. So this is my attempt at banging something out that is a) relevant and b) quick and to the point. A theme I hope to continue...]
“Mobile + Location Aware” are the buzzwords du jour. A year or two ago, this is what had Foursquare on everyone’s radar. So when I saw this Mashable article on Top 5 Foursquare Mistakes Committed by Small Businesses, two things immediately came to mind.
The first was, “What would my buddy James over at The Social Business think?” (and, yes, that’s a bit of a shameless plug, but if you’re a small business owner here in Central Oregon, struggling with the ever-changing landscape of social marketing, James is a great resource.) The second was, “Isn’t the #1 mistake wasting time worrying about FourSquare?”
Admittedly, I have little/no interest in Foursquare. ’Never particularly got into that scene, nor do I plan to. But it does seem like there’s been a some fal off in the buzz on this front. And data from Alexa seems to confirm that:
Maybe it’s just me, but if I were a small 1-5 person business, I’d focus my efforts where I’d get the most bang for the buck: Twitter, Facebook (who I work for, admittedly), Google… FourSquare would pretty far down my list.
Thoughts?
I think it’s a good insight that Foursquare buzz has simmered down with Facebook and Twitter adding checkins (at least in Facebook’s case) and locations. But, I think it takes a little more research before writing off Foursquare (and heck you could say the same thing about gowalla, which I’ve never really used). Go where the customers are. If I’m a business getting checkins and/or my competitors are getting checkins, then engage further on Foursquare, you don’t have to do it blindly. If nobody is using it in my area or my business, then by all means don’t waste the time. But, at least sign up as a vendor and see if it’s worth looking more.