San Diego Internet Marketing Blog

Location based applications are hot right now.  Foursquare, Gowalla, Facebook Places - the list of services is growing and users are catching on.  Not familiar with these types of applications?  Put simply, these applications are a way for you to "check in" to a specific venue or location (e.g. a restaurant, park, retail store) through a mobile device (e.g. iPhone, Android phone) and share that location with your friends and followers.

What's the value, you may ask?  By sharing their locations, users can see where their friends are and schedule a spontaneous meetup if they are within close proximity to one another.  Most of these services also feature a "mayor" (in Foursquare speak) - this is the user who has checked into a particular venue the most.

So why would anyone be a "mayor"? Well there is an element of having bragging rights, but probably more importantly, businesses are starting to reward their "mayors" special perks, such as a gift certificate or special discount.  Businesses are essentially rewarding customer loyalty and these customers are competing for these special rewards by frequently visiting their favorite stores.

What's in it for businesses? Location based marketing.  With these types of applications, you can market to consumers if they are in close proximity to your business.  In Foursquare, for example, a "Special Nearby" banner shows up if you have a special offer available and a consumer is nearby to your business.  Through this technique, you can attract new customers because they are just around the corner and may be interested in your special offer.

Businesses can also foster customer loyalty and repeat visits.  One of the most popular examples is the "free chips and salsa" that you can get at your local Chili's restaurant, simply by checking into Foursquare and showing your check in screen to your server.  Just recently, McDonald's head of social media, Rick Wion, mentioned that there was a "33% increase in checkins" from a Spring pilot program using Foursquare.  With this campaign, McDonald's randomly awarded $5 and $10 gift cards to those who check into Fousquare.  How much did this cost the large corporation? $1,000 for the gift cards - probably one of the most inexpensive marketing campaigns run by the fast food giant.

What's the downside?  Well, according to a Forrester Research report, only 4% of US online adults have ever used location based applications - definitely nothing to get too excited about - yet.  Even certain business staff who are supposed to be aware of these campaigns are not familiar with their existence (the local Chili's management wasn't aware of the free chips and salsa deal, or even Foursquare, when I showed the check in screen to them).  But like social media marketing and marketing in general, experimentation is key.  While the numbers don't indicate a significant reach for any campaign, the McDonald's campaign suggests that good results can occur with an extremely low investment.

Will it work for your business?  Like any other marketing initiative, experiment and see.

Judging by the astounding growth of online video viewership (close to 125% in 2009), there is no doubt about the tremendous opportunity that has emerged for marketers.  Sure, online video still has a long way to go before it gets close to television viewership but eMarketer predicts that online video viewership will nearly double to 11.8 billion total hours in 2010. 

As a business owner, you strive to educate your customers and prospects about your products and services.  Now think about one of the most effective ways that people learn – it’s the interactive audio-visual medium (a.k.a. video)!  There can be no better way to show the use of your product, make a presentation about a new concept, share information and ideas to encourage better utilization of your products and services, promote an event, discuss a client success story or case study, and so much more. Using the combined power of voice, text, image, music and perhaps, a little bit of drama (for effect), a simple video can engage your target audience like nothing else can.

If you’re thinking, “Video is expensive”, “I don’t have time to create videos”, “Video marketing is too slow”, “Video takes too much technical knowledge, skills and effort”…STOP!  From school teachers to chefs, MLM pros to fitness instructors, chocolate makers to computer manufacturers, everyone has used online video and very successfully at that.  You don’t need to hire an expert videographer or have fancy cameras, lights and software. There are ways to create and market online videos quickly, affordably and efficiently. You just need to know what market trends prevail and which best practices yield the best results.

Google’s 2010 Super Bowl Ad was a 52 second video.  If you haven’t seen it before, take a quick look here. 

Lost in Paris aren’t you?  The video didn’t do that.  You did!  As your eyes followed the text and online search on your screen, your mind wandered off picturing everything from chocolate to coffee, Le Louvre to the Eiffel Tower, Parisian models to French couture, and more!  See how plain text scrolling on a screen and simple, really subtle, unobtrusive music can have that effect on you?  No images, no photographs, no fancy graphics or use of color, and yet, the video makes you see so much, within the realm of your own imagination!  That’s the power of online video.

Sure, Google is one of the biggest, most well-known companies in the world today and they paid an astronomical figure to play this video during Super Bowl (CBS charged 3 million dollars for a 30 second commercial!).  Think about it, you could create a video like that sitting in your own office or home, however.  The most important thing is to get your brand into the mind of your customer, and to do that, you have to think like the customer and find a niche that you’d like to occupy.

Most of us are guilty of letting our LinkedIn accounts site idle. Other than “View Invitation” and “Accept /Reject Invitation”, we do little else with it. Creating a LinkedIn profile brings within its fold, a set of unwritten roles and responsibilities, which deliver great results when followed.

Before we get to that, ask yourself this one important question – is your LinkedIn profile complete, professionally done and updated often? If you answered “no”, then you’ve got to start at the very basics! There is no point in having an online profile page that does not truly represent who you are, what qualifications and experience you bring to possible business associates and why other LinkedIn members should invite you to their network of connections.

Presenting a professional image of yourself is critical and a LinkedIn profile is a great tool you can use for this purpose. By getting recommendations from well connected members in your network, you can manage and build a strong reputation as well. It is also a great way to showcase testimonials from happy customers!

It is not complicated, though, perhaps a tad time consuming in the beginning to set up a good profile page on LinkedIn. Take the time to build your LinkedIn profile and you can’t go wrong.