I’ve been investigating location based apps on my phone, netbook and other gadgets and following the trend of people living with a device in their hand at all times.
Why would you want to do this?
We’ve always used any communications device we can to stay in touch with family and friends.
“Give me a call when you get there”
“Check in to let me know you are okay”
“Can you pick up a loaf of bread on you way”
Now technology allows you to do this with ease, add all your friends to the conversation, and have some fun while you are doing it.
By checking in from my new favorite frozen yogurt shop, I was awarded the mayor badge. The interesting thing is.. I knew it would happen, I know it has almost now meaning, but when I got the notice I was a bit excited.
As far as I can tell, this is the entire game here. Click to check in, and get a message that you are doing a good job of it.
Foursquare Grows By 300% in the Last Two Months
Location sharing social network Foursquare saw traffic to its site triple in the last two months since November, according to new numbers from traffic analyst firm Hitwise today. The service has seen unprecedented media coverage lately and is no doubt sending more updates to Facebook and Twitter, prompting the growth in visits back to Foursquare that Hitwise is measuring.
Thinking How This Location Based Service Can Be Used by Authors
To date, I’ve just been adding friends who request a connection on Foursquare. It’s a general group and watching them check in is mildly amusing.. about like Twitter when I first started there.
As these services grow, I envision more ways to interact with readers by building a group of people that have said they were interested in your book or topic and happen to be in the same area. Imagine holding a book store signing, a seminar or conference and knowing which readers are there and what they are interested in.
Much of this data is already out there. We have reading lists, wish lists, group lists and social media gathering data based on interest. Twitter has added geo-coding to every tweet.
We are not sure what’s coming next.. but it is coming.
Are you using Foursquare? Leave a comment and let’s talk about using it to listen to our readers, show them more love, attract more readers and create best seller promotions.
A few years back, I helped an author become an instant best seller with his book Think Two Products Ahead. It topped the Amazon Best Seller List for non-fiction for a week and was #2 overall (beat only by the wizardy of Harry Potter)