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LOCATION BASED
SERVICES
Prepared by Keith Pinney

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For some, it might be hard (or impossible) to Today, that unit has now been universally replaced
cast your mind back to 1979, even more difficult by our new best friend the portable digital music
to remember the TPS-L2, or as it later became player along with a plethora of other portable
known in 20th century parlance; the ‘Walkman’. devices. Our personal hardware now seamlessly
integrates with the internet experience, connecting
From that moment in time, and well before the
and sharing content with cameras, video, gaming,
concept and ubiquity of the home computer
TV and hundreds of thousands of applications.
(much less the portable PC or mobile phone), a
dizzying array of devices surged into the public We now indeed seem to be living Kraftwerk’s vision
consciousness and onto and into the heads of tens of the anywhere, anytime always connected world
of millions of people all over the globe. in the 21st century, albeit from our pockets.
Music had moved quite literally out of the pubs, The impact of this constant connection to content,
clubs, bedrooms and living rooms and for many, services, networks and each other, whether at
the soundtracks to their lives were created, edited, home, or wherever we may be, has placed sharp
compiled and shared around on the (now not so) focus on what the potential is for our beloved
portable media formerly known as the ‘compact handsets. And it is very much, just the beginning.
cassette’. Later superseded by the Compact Disc,
In a recent report published by Morgan Stanley,
Mini Discs and the rest as they say is history.
there is an interesting insight that states we are
Indeed many people would entering the ‘5th Cycle of computing’, that of the
have first heard the term mobile internet which points to the enormous
‘Home Computer’ while upswing in app usage and content consumption.
listening to Kraftwerk’s 1981
This is clearly reflected in leading markets with a
electronic masterpiece LP
high adoption of smart phone technology and with
(Long Player for those not
increasingly cheaper access to greater bandwidth.
of that generation), ‘Computer World’, portending
a future where we would be forever tethered to In fact, when compared to regular ‘feature phone’
technology and data. All while wandering around shipments, in North America at least, smartphone
town or sitting on the subway. sales look set to eclipse these regular handsets
in 2011.
(Interesting to note that much of the lyrical content
centered around the privacy of information and Add to that the fact that 550 million of these GPS
how it would be shared) enabled devices are forecast to be sold around the
world by 2012, and it’s not hard to see there is a
One could argue that this was the first real moment
very interesting story emerging.
in history where people and technology were
connected to content they could control on the
move (bar the car radio), and at a price most could
end up affording.
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KICK OFF
Much of this initially of course can be attributed You have the backbone of why location based
to Apple’s introduction of the iPhone in 2007, and services are fast becoming the latest, greatest
the subsequent ‘Techgeist’ of other manufacturers story in this space.
innovating around the model and in every case,
It is also very much linked to the desire by
looking to improve it.
networks to grow ARPU and where there will be
Rapidly, Google and its Android platform are sure to be a new battleground as we head toward
looking to assail this position. Most recently stating 4G and beyond.
the objective of entering the music distribution
In essence then, a new context has emerged
marketplace, Apple’s hallowed ground. Watch that
for advertisers, marketers, content creators,
space in the coming months, as this will be sure to
business owners, visitors or just simple
be a mobile play.
bystanders all linked to the real and virtual worlds,
Interestingly enough, even in Japan where it can’t on the go.
be disputed the birth of the mobile internet truly
had it’s genesis with NTT’s DoCoMo in 1999,
Apple handsets have taken almost no time in
establishing a prominent position (although in 4th Some notable pundits have
place at the time of writing with handset sales called Location Based Services
behind other Japanese manufacturers).
the ‘Epicenter’ of mobile
So, when you add the ability of these handsets innovation, so here goes.
(and the rapidly emerging ‘tablet world’) to handle
the delivery of a vast galaxy of up to the second
content, services and personal networking, to the
increasing trend of Telcos offering flat packet rates.
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The
Commerce Utility
Geo
Spot
Community
The 3 Lenses
NEO GEO
Key to the success and adoption of location based services, is the accuracy and relevance of Geo Data
and ultimately the accuracy of location determination (LD), for a user to a specific service.
Access to that data (and it’s currency) therefore defines how well a service can interact within that space
and deliver salient up to the second information.
We’ll look at the 3 areas in the developed markets that make up the current offering to users and marketers
and how the landscape is moving and converging quicker than with what developers can dream up.
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GEO TAGGING:
Geo tagging is described as the process of adding although now mainstream, became location ‘aware’
geographical metadata to media where it can be in November 2009. Recently acquiring ‘Mixer Labs’
accessed by a handset. which they will almost certainly utilise to build out
their own location driven applications.
Or, a little more simply the capability for businesses,
content owners, creators and users to place Powerful stuff when combined, especially when
information, comment or deliver offers at a specific considering their current 16 million strong business
place and time. database and the ability to include media layers to
enhance this offering.
Although currently much of these actions tend to
be more like pins on a map, or made up of ‘badges Additionally, whilst the powerhouses of Google and
or mayors’ based on checking in, increasingly Microsoft have extraordinary mapping services,
with the advent of AR (Augmented Reality), the the likelihood is they may seek to further acquire
capability for these ‘points’ to be rich in information existing complimentary businesses such as Loopt
is fast approaching. Targeted not only to broad to augment their Geo offerings. A good example
offers, but increasingly specific and detailed of this being Google’s recent interest in Yelp,
content shared peer to peer(s). something that could enhance both their Latitude
(formerly ‘Dodgeball’) and Place Pages products.
The interoperability between various platforms will
be key to seeing this become a more powerful Geo tagging is also progressively becoming
socially enabled action, ‘sharing’ the location more automated. This will increase the frequency
and aggregating these datapoints, and ultimately users add locations to their social data, inflate the
creating a virtual ‘crumb-trail’ for others to follow, volume of locality related information and create
exchange and interact with. new opportunities for services that collect, sort and
share location based content.
Many of the players in this space, are still relatively
small and leverage other services to promote and
enable this function, Twitter on the other hand
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GEO NETWORKING:
With the potential offered up by Geo Tagging allied The fact that the massive and growing domination
to the enormous projected proliferation of smart, of social giant Facebook (in certain countries at
GPS enable handsets, the future on a mobile social least) constitutes 400M+ people with over 160M
scale for users and advertisers looks decidedly of these accessing their profile via their handset.
bright. It seems very clear that social networks and
their instant appeal have a big future in the LBS
Increasingly, with cross-platform operability,
ecosystem.
aggregators such as Tweetdeck, Facebook and
Wikitude allow users to shuffle between multiple Personal location based updates will be as
services and jack these into their Geo-Coded common as changing status and could well
location. Sharing content, experiences, data and develop into one of the most valuable aspects
dialogue seamlessly across these networks. of the social networking universe. As long as
marketers understand the responsibility associated
The potential for brands and marketers to then
with this information and the Telcos continue to
be placed at the heart of these conversations
play nicely. After all, it is still their infrastructure that
opens up huge opportunity to create transactional
provides the backbone of these services to the
offers or messages. Enabling brands, retailers and
handset.
businesses to take part precisely at the right time
and right place.
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GEO TARGETING
So, with all these billions of pieces of metadata, has to offer to the user. Whether it be content,
what to do with it? offers, rewards or simply ‘tips’.
As with any technical application into the ‘real Location-based social networking (or dubbed ‘lo
world’, there has to be a layer or interface that so’) currently forms the best lens to be able to take
helps connect the relevancy of ‘data’ to the user. this data and apply it into a commercial context
that resonates with users and businesses alike.
We are no longer sitting behind a captive, fixed
screen environment, seated and immobile. Instead, So, looking briefly at some of the current crop there
we draw the data to us, accessing in our own time are some clear commonalities across the offering.
and space, created as a sort of personalized digital As this space emerges we can more than likely
‘vector’. expect some consolidation as these morph into
larger platforms and networks.
So, the impact of this is that there is a greater need
for the saliency of information and what a location
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LBS IN MOTION:
A SNAPSHOT OF 3 PLAYERS
foursquare:
Like many of the currently dominant location based Twitter and Facebook.
services, foursquare’s offering is based upon
A system of rewards serves as the incentive for
interaction within a social context at a space and
using the application and by ‘checking in’, status is
point in time. Users either add existing foursquare
attained in the form of badges being accumulated
members to their network, or invite others to join
by visitors. Actions such as frequently checking
and participate.
into multiple venues in one day, or a single venue
They are able to view the locations and activities of on multiple occasions reward the most active with
others within their network and contribute content, ‘Mayoral status’ in the form of a badge.
read reviews or absorb tips placed at registered
As of March 2010 foursquare was the largest of
venues by other foursquare users. In terms of
all location-based services, with over 1.3M users
cross-functionality, this content has the capacity
worldwide, and steadily growing.
to be pushed to other social ecosystems such as
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LBS IN MOTION:
A SNAPSHOT OF 3 PLAYERS
Brightkite:
Established in 2007, Brightkite allows users to Whilst Brightkite has avoided employing social
connect with existing friends and meet new gaming principles like points, leaderboards
Brightkite users based on the places they visit. and rewards, it has embraced traditional social
Users may check in using SMS, Email, Mobile pastimes such as group conversations and the
browser or iPhone, Android and Blackberry publishing of images against locations for other
mobile apps. users to view and comment on.
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LBS IN MOTION:
A SNAPSHOT OF 3 PLAYERS
Gowalla:
Gowalla is ostensibly based on the same principles into. Items can be collected at certain venues, such
as foursquare however there are slight differences. as a margarita at a Mexican restaurant or a tour
The application itself has a greater focus on design bus at a concert. Items collected replace those
and usability, with emphasis on the application previously collected.
tonally feeling more like a game than a pure social
Being slightly more egalitarian, Mayorship cannot
networking tool.
be obtained at venues, replaced instead by a top
Users have a Gowalla ‘passport’, in which stamps 10 list for the most frequent visitors.
are awarded every time a new venue is checked
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PLATFORMS
Existing social platforms like Twitter and Facebook Perhaps the most interesting development using
have succeeded in part thanks to the early all three of these location based services platforms
publication of an API (Application Programming is the release of check.in. Built entirely in HTML5
Interface) for third party developers to consume by Brightkite, check.in aggregates place data from
data and create new utility for the respective Foursquare, Gowalla, and Brightkite to provide
communities. a much richer location data set. Based on user
account settings, check.in has the ability to publish
Foursquare, Gowalla and Brightkite all support
into multiple social networking platforms.
account sign up using Facebook and possess the
ability to publish into Facebook and Twitter. This However, whilst foursquare, Gowalla and Brightkite
has no doubt helped accelerate adoption and fight amongst themselves for the title of Location
raised awareness of these new platforms in such a Based Services ‘Champion of the World’, they face
rapid timeframe. stiff competition from the established players, well
entrenched with their desktop and mobile services
Brightkite and Foursquare both have rich, arguably
and with significantly greater populations.
well-documented APIs. Gowalla has a read-only
API, which rather limits the creativity of third party As indicated earlier, Twitter entered the “Place
developers. It may come as no surprise then, that Race” in late 2009 and Facebook are now
foursquare has roughly five times the amount of rumoured to be imminently launching their own
developers registered in their Developer Google native LBS capability.
Group than Gowalla.
Both of these networks boast user numbers in
More and more third party apps are beginning the 100’s of millions and a fair number of these
to appear. Yipit analyses your foursquare check users already use mobile apps to share content
in history, then monitors those venues for offers. with their friends when out and about. Enhancing
Layar, the augmented reality browser, can reveal these networks to be location capable is merely an
who the mayor is, who’s currently checked in and upgrade away.
what tips lay in wait for you when you point your
handset in the direction of a Foursquare venue.
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THE IMPLICATIONS
OF GEOGRAPHY
It’s no surprise that many of the start-ups and In all metropolitan environments there are different
businesses in LBS are headquartered in cities with areas of intensity. Whether they be socially driven
significant conurbation in the United States, Asia (pubs, restaurants, bars and the like), dwellings
and Europe. or business hubs. Increasingly there is a trend
toward vast vertical developments and building
Take Four Square, headquartered in Manhattan
clusters offering mixed usage. Including of course,
for example. With a city based almost entirely
residential.
on a grid system, largely flat (with one or 2 minor
inclines) and very much a ‘walking’ city, you have a These areas are where high population and traffic
perfect virtual/physical ecosystem for services that provide the bases for complex interactions where
can attract users and businesses alike. Offering content can be created, fed and exchanged.
the potential to be virtually present on every street
corner. From Delis and Diners, to Dry Cleaners. It’s no surprise it is also where traditional
media tends to cost the most.
Even the name Four Square very much reflects the
cities spatial characteristics.
Conversely. If we take a look at a city not reliant
In this sense the media overlay seems very logical on dense and sophisticated public transport
and the ability to navigate as such, simpler. Largely hubs with geographic sprawl and where much
attributable to these topographical traits being of personal transportation is by car. You naturally
mirrored in the break up of neighborhoods based have less of a place where people walk. A different
on what they offer to the ‘walker/browser’. set of conditions then might apply. Los Angeles or
Auckland would examples of this.
Factors such as commercial density and physical
land attributes very much play a part in defining Again, marketers and advertisers should be
what services create the best fit for inhabitants or cogniscent of to whom it is they are trying to
visitors. Remembering we are of course blurring connect with, and by what means and point in
the boundaries between the real and virtual time this contact will have the greatest effect and
environments and therefore, there should be a resonance.
simple and elegant match as to how these worlds
interlock through a superimposed interface.
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GRAB A SLICE
A fitting example of the differences might be 2 In the instance of a more suburban environment,
pizza restaurants offering specials on a slice of which may represented by longer stretches of
Pizza. One on Bleeker Street in Manhattan and the arterial roadway with distance to convergence
other in a mall in Reseda, CA. points being greater, you will often find clusters
of businesses or hubs such as malls or business
Both share one trait, in that their street array is set
parks for example. Much of the ‘traffic’ therefore is
in grids, but that is where the comparison ends.
vehicular.
With the vast numbers of commuters in New York,
The timing of offers and the draw to a location may
using high frequency public transport, walking or
therefore be less frequent and more suited to be
cabbing, the city is very much about numerous
a planned experience for potential shoppers. The
and frequent shorter journeys between points and
occasion may be centered around managing a visit
neighborhoods.
to a location for multiple reasons.
Individuals in general are walking past large
To that point, that location may be well serviced by
numbers of separate businesses in a single day.
having clusters of businesses link or aggregate their
Due in part of course to urban density and the
respective offerings, in order to maximize ‘dwell
compactness of the location in terms of physical
time’. This thereby creating the opportunity to have
area. The chance for ‘drop in’ traffic for example
multiple transactions or interactions in one locale,
then is high. Particularly if the offer of that discount
or framed up all under the one roof.
pizza slice occurs as you are walking past or in
the near vicinity around mealtime (especially if you
are identified as a regular). The business thereby,
creates virtual occassionality with its customers.
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COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS
Still staying on the fast food tip.
Let’s have a quick look at the McDonald’s digital With nearly 80% of handsets all RF enabled
coupon mobile service in Japan. A truly ubiquitous in Japan, increasingly these near field
and mass-market application specific to a localized capabilities are anchored to promotions driven
mobile Ecosystem around specific locations.
This is particularly interesting due to the structure
of a joint venture between the fast food giant A simple mechanic to illustrate this is releasing
and NTT’s DoCoMo; an abbreviation of “do coupons at around the time schools get out, and
communications over the mobile network” and also where there is proximity of that school to an outlet.
from the phrase ‘dokodemo’, meaning everywhere
The ability to resist that temptation just got a little
in Japanese.
harder for some.
DoCoMo is the largest mobile operator in Japan
The difference here is in the way the Telco has
closely followed by KDDI’s ‘AU’ and Softbank, who
embedded a service into a mass outlet presence.
interestingly are to date the only carrier supporting
It hasn’t tapped into a social ecosystem such as
the iPhone in Japan.
Mixi, the largest SNS in Japan (much loved on
Leveraging the vast network of McDonald’s retail mobile), but rather a bespoke offering around
footprint and the love of coupons, users register POS and location services augmented by handset
themselves to the service and are sent up to the capabilities.
minute specials based on preference and location
specific data.
Coupon redemption can be via simply showing
the coupon on screen at point of sale or by
simply passing the RF enabled handset over the
integrated iD scanner (as below).
This not only facilitates an update on your profile
activity and redemption to the database, it also
facilitates cashless payment and sets up the next
offer to be sent to the user.
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PRIVACY AND CULTURAL
IMPLICATIONS
So, if we are all increasingly mobile, dwelling in From the early adopters view and for those now
greater numbers in urban centres and letting reared in the era of the social web, the concept
friends, very distant cousins and the world know of privacy and personal content differs greatly to
exactly where we are at any given moment in time, many from the preceding Geny Y or X’ers. For
how secure is this personal data and what degrees many others, as was the case with e-commerce,
of control are available to us, the end user? familiarization and trust could well take a little
longer.
Simply put, much of that will depend where you
are and under what laws the network you are tied Four Square, although relatively young, has around
to operates within. 1.3M users and is the largest of the LBS providers
at this time. Quite a small number when you think
Ironically, in Japan which has increasingly
of the global scale of Facebook’s dominion.
implemented almost impenetrable privacy laws to
protect the consumer. The Government enacted But despite the size of their ‘digital continent’ with
a policy in 2007 that states that any phones a massive population of over 400M+, they are still
bought on new plans from that date would have not granted access to China’s over 1 billion souls.
their handset’s GPS chips permanently enabled. China along with many other countries who have
This was stated to be in the interests of ‘Law their own well established social networks have
Enforcement’. strongly integrated cultural and local attributes that
have created a firm foothold that will be hard to
As probably still the most advanced mobile
shake. This notwithstanding governmental controls
marketing enabled economy, Japan and its 109
that are also imposed in many states.
Million handsets still have roughly only 2% of
adspend applicable to the mobile space as of This is especially evident in the mobile sphere
2009. This still represented a growth of 60% from where in certain countries it is quite normal to be
the previous year and double the global numbers pushed advertisers messages and offers when
for that period. users are in proximity of an advertisers message or
offer. As indicated little earlier, this kind of conduct
Interestingly, while millions globally are happy
would be illegal in certain countries in the APAC
to share information over the PC centric web,
region incurring heavy penalties unless adhering to
operators and advertisers are not sure what
strict guidelines.
levels of tolerance users will have regarding the
monitoring and sharing of their location based For many the thought of allowing brands
activity from both a personal and commercial that close may be too close for comfort,
standpoint. essentially viewed as ‘people tracking’.
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PRIVACY AND CULTURAL IMPLICATIONS CONT..
It is this safeguarding of privacy that has to date, consenting to accept the upgrade license, you are
remained firmly in the hands of the Telcos. giving Apple the license to both store and share
that information with 3rd parties.
Application developers o n the other hand (some
merely months old as start ups), have the clear This kind of information has usually been only
responsibility of adhering to the principles of user available from networks to the emergency services
notice and consent. Being acutely aware also of in times of crime, or crisis. It begs the question
the differences from market to market, ensuring where AT&T is in all of this.
users know how and to whom their location
So, the ongoing question of privacy will need to be
information is to be disclosed.
anchored to degrees of transparency. Essentially,
To further highlight just how quickly this domain what you as the individual are prepared to give up
is evolving, at the time of writing the iPhone ‘iOS4’ for these services in terms of how, where and to
has recently been released. Interestingly (if not with whom your location and personal details may
slightly concerning), the new terms and conditions be shared with. Doing this with the trust that those
regarding location information highlight what is who hold onto it (often in perpetuity), will do so
clearly Apple’s next play. responsibly.
They state they have the right to “collect, use and When you consider the speed and dynamics
share precise [your gadget’s] real time geographic of the M& A space in this sector, it is fair to
location”. say that who has your information today, may
not necessarily be the company who uses it
Whilst Apple have been using location information
tomorrow.
gathering for a while, the difference here is that by
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THE 4TH DIMENSION:
AR IS THE NEW VR
So, where to next? at a human level, overlaid with real time data into a
system that is both sensory and participatory.
Probably the most interesting and creative
interpretation of Location Based Services is the Sekai Camera (or world camera) is an application
advent of interpretive augmented reality. from Tokyo based Tonchidot.
Applications such as Layar or Acrossair, combine It is similar in many ways to Mobilizy’s ‘Wikitude’,
multiple functions of smartphones into a visual but takes the concept of cross-networking
overlay, that has been referred to as ‘Terminator between businesses and individuals to a level
Vision’. that might strike the right balance of how the
social, virtual and commercial layers harmoniously
These applications blur the lines between the virtual converge.
and non-virtual spaces, combining the video/
camera functions, GPS, and accelerometers. Although still in Beta stage, there is a logical and
Many view this convergence as the truest personal way that metadata attaches itself to a
expression of LBS. specific location and encourages exchange within
the app.
In essence, It’s a real time merging of two parallel
universes. The cybersphere with the biosphere. The concept here is that visitors, brands and
businesses literally ‘Air Tag’ these spaces. So as
Science Fiction? Maybe 3 years ago. But if we an example, a restaurant may leave its location
look at how rapidly this integration of a few simple data, directions, menus, reviews and specials of
handset features has taken shape, it does seem the day. A previous visitor or patron can leave their
that the marveled sequences in certain movies just comments in text or voice or upload images or
5 years ago are now fast becoming the domain of video of their experience.
anyone who buys a new smart handset.
The application of this in the sense of a traveler
We are indeed entering the era of the ‘Geoweb’ or turning up in a new city for the 1st time on the
‘V-Sphere’. recommendation of a peer, could turn up and have
Virtual Reality essentially provided us with a world their friends experience left for them in rich detail. A
that was tangible in a visual and spatial sense, sort of rich, virtual Lonely Planet.
but largely based on fantasy. What we have with The restaurant, being aware of this exchange,
Augmented Reality is the real world practical could leave coupons or offers for that person to
application of vision, experience and information take up there and then.
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THE 4th DIMENSION: AR IS THE NEW VR CONT..
Taking that to another highly creative expression is the location you are in.
iButterfly. Created by Behemoth (no pun intended)
Again, a simple, elegant and highly creative use of
agency Dentsu.
3 core functions of the handset.
By loading the app, maps depict active locations
This is still in trial, but clearly illuminates the
and by simply holding the camera up, ‘virtual
potential for rich creative territory for marketers and
butterflies’ float around, which you need to swipe
advertisers alike.
at and ‘catch’. Each butterfly collected may contain
a different offer, which can then be redeemed at
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A great many of the readers of this piece will way of these core functions might not work to
already be active users of some, or many of the advantage if perceived as interruptive
services we have covered briefly here.
As devices are proliferating and evolving, there
The key question for many however, will be what will increasingly be new hardware to consider.
are the real and practical applications for brands, With this in mind also, the functionality of these
agencies and marketers when it comes to services will need to continually adapt. It’s
activating the potential of the LBS ecosystem. important to think of how any integration will fit
the experience, no matter what their handset
The truth is, we are very much at the gates to a
capabilities are
new frontier if we indeed believe this is the ‘5th
cycle of computing’. Many of the services in play Think of the physical landscape. How this
today will evolve and innovate independently, or in overlays with the objectives of the activity
turn be acquired by the ‘bigger fish’ to form part of and what the user will respond to based on
a wider service offering. the social and geographic attributes in each
location
Moreover, as every service sits on a small but
increasingly powerful piece of hardware, it remains Plan for and understand the privacy
to be seen where handset innovation will lead and implications dependent on the service and
drive how these services may evolve and expand what parameters and legislation may be in
their influence. Initially for the end user and then place. As indicated, dependent on where you
importantly, how these platforms move from are, there may be significant differences in how
making connections, to actual monetization for this is managed and how you would then plan
brands and businesses. activity around compliancy. Mitigate any risk to
the business objectives and the user
There are a few key points to be considered when
looking at how LBS can integrate into marketing
activities. Not surprisingly these resonate with So, whilst we have a uniquely fresh take on the
the traditional social media tenets of finding an role of the handset and a very interesting potential
audience (or a voice), and tapping into the potential future with a vast global audience. It is still a
for dialogue, collaboration and exchange. nascent era for mobile marketing and LBS. It
remains to be seen how marketers can prosper
from what has been established as a beachhead
Consider the kind of targeting that will mix
from these start-ups and their early adopters.
well with the platform offering and ensure
that the tone and creative approach matches One thing however is certain. It is one of the
the technology, interface and user/audience most interesting plays in the digital space when
expectation combined with the almost exponential growth of
mobile social networking, and will be sure to be
Assess and tap into the utility and community
among the most hotly contested for dominance in
aspects of what the service provides to the
the coming 12 to 18 months.
user. Why are they there? These applications
are essentially ‘enablers’ so getting in the Watch that space.
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Prepared by Keith Pinney,
Channel Planning Director,
AIM Proximity, Auckland
With assistance from Ian Hulme and Tenzin Pooch.