In real estate, the mantra has always been “location, location, location” to underscore the value of being in the right place.  Now, with the advent of geo-location social networks like FourSquare, GoWalla, Hot Potato and CauseWorld that mantra extends to the digitally connected world.  Only now, the physical location takes a back seat to the sharing of physically being at the location.  And, that sharing of location check-ins is valuable for both the providers of these services and marketers.  Which is why Twitter began … Read more

It started as a simple tweet: can you help and fill out this survey?  We’ll share results to all who participate.  Interested in the topic, I clicked on the link only to find a very short, poorly designed survey.  The survey had seven questions (not counting the email capture for results sharing) of which several were closed ended essentially binary questions — i.e, “yes”, “no” and “maybe” were the only answer options.  There were two open ends to collect unaided recall of favorite cause marketing programs and past participation in cause marketing programs.

I … Read more

In last Sunday’s New York Times Magazine, Wired Magazine contributing editor Guy Wolf profiled self-trackers — individuals who track their daily habits, whatever they may be — in The Data Driven Life.  Wolf acknowledges that people have long tracked their behavior — e.g., recording checks, noting their weight, caloric intake and output, etc.  But, in the past, that tracking was done by paper and pen. And, it was private.  Now, self-trackers have no shortage of web and mobile applications and devices that allow them to not only digitally record … Read more