Rick Jessup

foursquare Now Notifies with Radar

rickjessup — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 18:05:35 +0000

foursquare founder Dennis Crowley hasn’t made it a secret that he’s worked towards making his location-based service notify and recommend in real-time in a form of crowdsourcing-on-demand. With the launch of the Explore feature a user could gain recommendations based on popularity, friends’ check-ins, similar likes, lists and tips, and with yesterday’s launch of foursquare Radar, these recommendations and reminders can now be pushed to any phone using Apple’s latest mobile OS. Leveraging the new iOS 5 “region monitoring”, foursquare’s new v4.0 for iPhone now includes the option to opt-in to Radar. Once opted in the same engine used to power Explore monitors your location and compares it to: Tips you’ve marked as a To-Do Lists you’ve subscribed to Lists you’ve created Venues featuring three or more friends Any of these items then appears as a push notification on your iPhone, alerting you that you’re near somewhere you’ve either expressed interest in, or in which friends ...

Rick Jessup - Social | Digital | Location

Showtime Unlocks Check-In Success

rickjessup — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 18:59:53 +0000

It’s not a new story, by any means: Budgets are low so creativity has to be high. And while it may sometimes seem like the tale of the small, local business, the budget/creativity crunch can even affect the big guys. Case in point when Showtime was looking for a wallet-friendly way to promote their new reality show following the World Series Champions, ‘The Franchise: A Season with the San Francisco Giants.’ The solution? Looking to location-based marketing star, Foursquare, to get smartphone-wielding fans to check-in to The MLB Fan Cave at Broadway and East 4th Street in Manhattan, where a baseball dispenser would reward them with a branded MLB baseball, including some autographed by Hall of Famer Willie Mays. “We started to think how we would promote the show because the budget was extremely limited,” said George Debolt, senior vice president of media promotions and partnerships at Showtime. Their agency, OMD, ...

Rick Jessup - Social | Digital | Location

Is the iPhone 4S Worth It?

rickjessup — Wed, 05 Oct 2011 18:52:34 +0000

After over a year of rumours and conjecture, and at least one major delay, yesterday finally brought the latest Apple smartphone release with the iPhone 4S. Expectations seemed to surround the release of an iPhone 5, complete with new format and size and revolutionary, industry leading features. But what was released was an iPhone 4 with improved innards and an OS update, iOS 5, that enhances the phone, but also enhances all iPhones as far back as the 3GS. So what was announced and what does it mean to those thinking of updating? 8MP Camera with 1080P Video The past three years have seen smartphones slowly chip away at the “point and shoot” camera world with gradually increasing megapixels and features. The world has responded by slowly leaving their old cameras at home – a search on Flickr shows the iPhone is the most used “camera” on the photo sharing website. The ...

Rick Jessup - Social | Digital | Location

Is Google+ Ready for Prime Time?

rickjessup — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 21:10:03 +0000

A little over four months ago the world’s largest search engine, Google, launched their third significant attempt at a social network. Google+ integrated existing Profiles and Buzz features with new Circles, Hangouts and Sparks, with Circles – the ability to organize friends into groups for content sharing – garnering the most positive publicity. In only two weeks 10 millions users accepted invites, and after Google+ was opened wide two weeks ago, quickly skyrocketed to over 40 million users. But what does Google+ mean to companies looking to social media as an acquisition and retention tool? And is Google+ the final nail in Facebook’s digital coffin? On June 28, 2011, after months of rumours and discussion, Google launched their post-Wave/Buzz attempt at social networking, Google+. Invites were dispensed through influencers, each having 150 invites to hand out to Google users 18 or older with a requirement to use a real name. Important ...

Rick Jessup - Social | Digital | Location

Scrapbook + Nostalgia = Facebook Timeline

rickjessup — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 17:23:58 +0000

By the time you’re reading this, assuming you’re one of over 750 million Facebook users, you’ve probably already met the new Facebook Timeline. This replacement for what had been Facebook Profiles was expected to go live in late September and provided a significant change in how a user’s profile information is displayed. Harnessing the power of nostalgia, Facebook has turned a profile into a scrapbook of their life, from birth to today in a visually stimulating interactive timeline that provides quick access to the moments that have impacted our lives. Facebook’s algorithms, as laid out in ‘The Social Network’, do an excellent job at predicting human emotion and desire. Facebook Timeline is no different, somehow separating the most impactful moments of our history from those more mundane and presenting it as a story. While it’s a significant change at first glance, no doubt an uncomfortable one for some, a bit ...

Rick Jessup - Social | Digital | Location

The Takeover Has Begun

rickjessup — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 15:20:42 +0000

I’m typing this from the reclaimed home office I abandoned in December of 2006 when I turned my back on Crafty Puppy to re-enter the “working for the man” work force. I’d spent six years attempting to make a mark simultaneously bringing international companies to a North American audience (paid bills) and working with small, local companies to get them online (did not pay bills) under the slogan “the takeover has begun.” High hopes? Maybe. It was an experience, but one I claimed I’d never do again. Yet here I am. Today marks the first official day of my yet-to-be-named company that will focus entirely on building content-driven, search optimized CMS websites in WordPress using domestic designers and coders (read: not eLance). The world has changed in the five years I’ve walked away, and I truly hope I’ll get the opportunity to showcase how the world of social media, and specifically location-based ...

Rick Jessup - Social | Digital | Location