ScreenScape becomes the Mayor of foursquare for digital signage
September 13, 2010
ScreenScape, the Canadian-based community-based digital signage network, today announced the availability of its foursquare widget, which it says is the first foursquare application for digital signage networks.
The widget enables businesses who use both ScreenScape and foursquare to recognize and reward foursquare users in real-time by showing custom foursquare content on digital displays inside their venue. ScreenScape members can start using the new widget today by logging into their account, as normal, and browsing to "add content."
The market for location-based services like foursquare is still maturing, but adoption numbers are growing quickly. Foursquare currently has more than 3 million registered users, and adds more than 100,000 new members a week. At the same time, marketers are still exploring how to best manage their promotional campaigns using location-based services and how to engage and reward users of the services on-premise. ScreenScape's foursquare widget gives businesses a tool to harness foursquare for highly targeted in-venue marketing, or "hyper-local marketing," that speaks directly to the customer and influences purchasing decisions in real-time.
By acknowledging and rewarding foursquare user check-ins, venues can deepen customer loyalty and encourage them to continue to visit their venue and check-in, as well as recommend their own network of friends to do the same, ScreenScape says.ScreenScape is built on open-Internet technology and delivered as software-as-a-service (SaaS). Businesses with multiple venues use ScreenScape to manage and push content out across screens in each venue. ScreenScape's foursquare widget helps businesses manage their foursquare campaigns across venues and ensure that staff members in each location are aware of current promotions. For instance, each venue can be equipped to deliver location-specific content such as welcoming the venue's foursquare "Mayor," while all company screens can display the same foursquare promotion.
"The strength of foursquare comes from our vibrant and fast-growing community of users. When we released our API, we were searching for companies that would create new mechanisms and platforms for helping businesses better engage with and reward our community," said Tristan Walker, director of business development for foursquare. "ScreenScape's new foursquare widget provides a valuable tool to businesses that allows them to take customer interactions to a real-time, visual level right inside their venues. The implications for this from a marketing perspective are vast."
Within their online account interface, ScreenScape Members can use the foursquare widget to customize and publish a range of foursquare slides on digital displays inside their venue. Currently, venue managers can program their displays to welcome the Mayor with their name and photo when they check-in, promote specials for foursquare users, broadcast the number of foursquare users in their venue and promote the venue's usage of foursquare. The widget is synched with foursquare's location-based technology so that the Mayor can be welcomed as soon as he or she checks into the venue.
Confederation Centre of the Arts is a National Historic Site of Canada that showcases Canadian visual and performance arts, and has been using ScreenScape since 2009 to power on-site screen displays that promote its products, services and partners to its patrons. The Centre recently began using ScreenScape's foursquare widget to promote its foursquare theater specials.
"As a venue that relies heavily on repeat business and customer loyalty, ScreenScape has become a vital part of our marketing efforts. The availability of a ScreenScape widget for foursquare is very intriguing to us," said Penny Walsh, director of marketing of the Confederation Centre of the Arts. "This widget will give us the opportunity to communicate even more directly to our most loyal patrons and provide highly targeted, meaningful rewards."
