Like most of my blog posts, I’ve been kicking this one around in my head for a while, not really sure if it’s worth posting or not. Then I heard about the upcoming Evolution of Foursquare Marketing Social Fresh panel, and thought the post just might be topical enough to publish.

For those of you who don’t know, Foursquare is a location-based social media service that allows users to “check in” at locations using their smart phone of choice. It was started by a couple of guys in New York City who wanted to get to know their city a little better by keeping up with where their friends were hanging out; e,g.,”Hey, I see that Chet just checked in at Clyde’s Pub over on 98th. I didn’t even know there was a pub over there. Nice.”

Right away you can see the marketing potential for restaurants, bars, retail outlets, and other places that have (and want more) foot traffic. When I check in at my local deli/pub Southsiders, all of my Twitter followers and Facebook friends (and Foursquare friends, for that matter) know about it. If they trust my judgment and have never heard of Southsiders, they might be inclined to check it out.

That’s all fine and good for places that get a lot of customers through the door, but at 1060 Creative, we’re a service-based company. Hence, we don’t get a lot of foot traffic. Sure, clients will come by to drop off or pick up stuff, or sit in on an edit, but largely, our door remains closed throughout the day. So how does a company like us market themselves with Foursquare?

Warning: what follows will probably not rock your Marketing World, but maybe it’ll spark an idea. The bottom line is that I don’t have a complete answer, but I can tell you that the use of Foursquare’s “Tips” feature is a way to at least let people know you’re in the area. Basically, Tips work like this: a user can leave a recommendation for visitors to a particular venue (“While you’re at Clyde’s Pub, please…try the veal”). These tips will pop up when a user checks into the venue. Furthermore, and this is important, a user’s phone will also display recommendations for venues that are near his or her current location; e.g., Chet checks in at Clyde’s Pub and a tip pops up, “Since you’re near Tony’s Pizza, try the Wednesday special. Free anchovies!”

To that end, we recently received a couple of inquiries about our services based on tips I posted. They’re pretty simple and generic, really:

• The tip for our current location in Fort Mill states, “Call on 1060 Creative for all your video production, post-production, and motion graphics needs. Visit www.1060creative.com or call 704-332-0111 for more info.” Well, someone checked in at location nearby, and our tip popped up. He called us the next day.
• Our old offices were in the Uptown Charlotte area. When we moved, I left a tip that informed people that we had moved, along with all the pertinent information. That tip also resulted in a phone call when someone checked in at a nearby business. (Note: yes, I know I should mark that location as “closed”, but, um, I have no plans to do so. Do the math. Bonus discussion question: Does that make me a bad Foursquare user?)

I related the above to a friend of mine (Jim Mitchem of Smash Communications) over lunch at a local sushi restaurant. In a more clever approach, he left this tip for the restaurant: “I had my first sushi here. Which reminds me, you should hire me for your next communications campaign.” I don’t think he’s had a nibble on that yet, but it’s out there, and who knows? Right? Hell, I’d call him I ran across that tip. Makes me chuckle…and I like hiring people who make me chuckle.

Anyway…look, I’m well aware that two measly phone calls and a non-sequitur comment made at a sushi joint is neither proof nor an example of the sizzling success that can be had by using Foursquare to market your company. But then again, to paraphrase an old friend, those phone calls were “two more than we’d received the day before”.

Something to think about, anyway.

–Ant.