When Foursquare came out I was seriously into it. Grabbing badges, setting new locations, coining in on points, etc, etc…
I held down 10 Mayorships to be a Super Mayor and unlocked some where in the region of 15 badges. Ok, not serious numbers for either but for what?
That’s the point that really escapes me now when I look at Foursquare.
Some say it’s helpful exploring new cities as the To Do’s and Tips kinda come in helpful. I sort of agree but are you going to spend £100 on a meal out at restaurant recommended by a Foursquare user (maybe the restaurant owner!) or are you going the check on TopTable – my vote goes to the latter.
Some say in very ‘social media orientated cities’ (such as Chicago I was told) Foursquare is super useful to keep in touch with the like-minded.
So it’s a social tool for socialrati? Hmmm…that probably wouldn’t be well heard by Naveen Selvadurai one of the two creators.
I’m not a glass-half-empty sort of person by nature but I have to say that I am struggling with Foursquare personally at the moment. The thing that keeps me going is that one of my colleagues ousted me as the Mayor of the agency and that pissed me off – so I am back at it to boot him back out!
On a serious note though I can see huge benefits within the UK to using Foursquare when more multi and single site retail businesses become fully engaged as have Starbucks, Dominos, etc. Until we see more on the platform people will remain struggling with the “Check-in for what reason” point of view.
