Archive for the ‘LBS’ Category

Social Mobile: Do games work?

Sunday, April 10th, 2011

 

We’ve watched with interest as Loopt, FourSquare, and Gowalla experiment with games to incent interaction.  But one wonders whether the game is needed because the content is lacking?  In other words, what else do you get out of “checking-in” besides checking in?  It’s no wonder that we’re starting to see discounts, coupons, and recognition bolster the game model.  Along these lines, we’ve become interested in customer loyalty programs and their success at achieving their intended goals–customer recognition, increased customer interaction, and increased customer loyalty.

We thought this article on poorly conceived customer loyalty programs was terrific!  We agree, that there is a real risk that a loyalty program will engender loyalty to the program, not necessarily the company or the brand.  After much thought, we’ve developed a hybrid model with elements of gaming and customer recognition.  In essence, we have two programs, one where some of our most active users can publicly and informally compete for bragging rights, and another where we publicly recognize our outstanding users for their roles in helping us achieve our corporate goals.

We decided to use social media and published thank you’s on users’ Facebook walls to publicly recognize them for their loyalty and support.  We also included a gift certificate from Amazon.

Customer Recognition to Increase Brand Loyalty

Customer Recognition to Increase Brand Loyalty

Shortly after these were posted on customer’s walls, there was a bump in site traffic and downloads indicating that our customers’ friends appreciated our customer appreciation.

 

 

 

Simultaneously, we published a leaderboard  because we noticed that it encouraged competition among users who care about and enjoy a little competition.  Below is the first leaderboard.  No prizes are awarded, just bragging rights.  We’ll be watching over the next few months to see how the different programs work independently and together in helping us help our users enjoy the product and recommend it to their friends.

Welcome to the April 2011 ChimpIt Leaderboard!

As an active Chimper, you have soared through the ranks of commoners and have landed a coveted spot on our whimsical leaderboard. Through a mysterious calculation, your Chimping has been scored and we have bestowed you with meaningless Rank, Level, and Title.  Some of you have even managed to attain a Level and Title above your Rank.  Well done, you clever Chimpers!  Keep on Pimpin’ da Chimpiin’ and don’t worry yourself over the “points”– they are for entertainment purposes only.  Thanks for being a good sport and a good customer.

We hope you continue to enjoy Smart WiFi and ChimpIt!

Rank

Username

Leaderboard

Level/Rank

1

normo 155 L0 – Chimper

2

chefmuhs 90 L0 – Chimper

3

unless_spring 85 L0 – Chimper

4

h.skrille 75 L0 – Chimper

5

Dustie64 62 L5 – Supreme Solid Chimper in Waiting

6

owlspectre 50 L0 – Chimper

6

lisajean 50 L0 – Chimper

6

coltrice17 50 L0 – Chimper

9

palonghorn 48 L3 – Power Chimper

10

mnaylor 47 L4 – Mega Chimper

– Less Networks ChimpIt Team
www.chimpit.com

Social-Loco Startup Competition

Sunday, April 10th, 2011

 

Social-Loco Startup Competition

Social-Loco Startup Competition

 

Enter the Social-Loco Startup Competition for a chance to pitch your company to 100s of

social-location obsessed VCs, angel investors, executives and media at the 2011 Social-Loco conference in San Francisco. ENTER NOW!

Vote for ChimpIt as your favorite Social-Loco startup.  Click here to view our profile and cast your vote.

Social-Loco: the convergence of the social web, mobile and local-business

Sunday, April 10th, 2011
Social-Loco Conference

Social-Loco Conference

 

Social-Loco: the convergence of the social web, mobile and local-business

Social-Loco will dive into social and mobile web convergence, and what that means for SMB, big brands and consumers. Learn from real-world successes in daily deals, location based services and advertising, mobile marketing platforms and more. Executives from Groupon, Facebook, Google, ATTi, Microsoft and leading investors will address these topics in a highly interactive setting.

Social-Loco takes place on May 5, 2011 at the Mission Bay Conference Center in San Francisco.  ChimpIt will be demo’ing there and giving away our cool schwag.  Come on out to participate and meet us.  We’d love to meet you!

Read more and register

ChimpIt Walk-Through / SXSW 2011 Launch

Tuesday, March 8th, 2011
ChimpIt. You are here.  Here's what's near.

ChimpIt. You are here. Here's what's near.

Ever since Gowalla launched at SXSW 2009, notebook users worldwide have felt neglected.  While the check-in wars have waged on between Gowalla, FourSquare, and Loopt (who?), notebook users have sat on the sidelines wondering why smartphones get all the cool apps.

  
The wait is over.
  
For two years, the slowpokes at Less Networks have labored to bring the world a better WiFi experience and they call it “ChimpIt.”  ChimpIt is a small downloadable notebook check-in app with a few interesting characteristics.
First of all, you don’t need to check in.  ChimpIt is a convenient “no check-in required” app because it can automatically detect your location down to the business and street address–often without having to select from a list.  For those of you lucky enough to have stalkers, don’t worry.  ChimpIt doesn’t automatically share your location, but you can if you want.  And since you’re on a notebook, the “experience sharing” capability makes it very easy to type out a rant to your Facebook friends about why the coffee sucks or the mud pie is faboo.
  
At first glance, ChimpIt looks like a simple mash-up of the usual players, Google, Yelp, Facebook, WeatherUnderground, Fandango, etc, but on closer inspection you realize that the ChimpIt team has cleverly assembled and fine-tuned these trusted brands in a way that is surprisingly convenient.  There’s a video demo on the website, but here’s an example.  If you are a traveler and you just arrived at your hotel in a strange city, ChimpIt will somehow figure out which hotel you’re at and then build a neighborhood portal to help orient you to your new surroundings.  It provides the weather, local deals nearby (more on this later), local radio stations and movie listings, a Google map on steroids, and a curious list of strange faces.
There’s seems to be more here than meets the eye.  Let’s begin with the local deals nearby, apparently sourced by fellow Austin startup WantandFound.  WAF allows anyone to type in their favorite drink special, culinary discovery, or shopping bargain, and then syndicates it.  ChimpIt organizes WAF deals by distance from your location.  Since anyone can submit a deal, there’s no quality-control, but on the other hand, the user community can publish and share deals way more effectively than the businesses themselves.  It seems to work out and provides tourists and travelers access to some local knowlege that might not be readily available.
  
Just a big mash up, or more?

Just a big mash up, or more?

The Google map at first is a yawn.  I mean, what’s so special about putting your location on a Google map?  Well, let’s give ChimpIt some credit for figuring out your location first.  Even though you just checked into a hotel, doesn’t mean you actually know your exact street address.  That comes in handy when it comes to navigating to your next destination and ChimpIt has got that down in spades.  Simply search for something like “taco” or “ATM” or “gas” and it becomes clear that the ChimpIt dev team has optimized your Google search to your exact location.  Instead of taco recipes or the history of the petroleum industry, you see exactly where the nearest locations are and if you click you get a bunch of reviews from all the usual sources.  If you click some more, you’ll get specific driving, walking, or transit directions.  The Google map on ChimpIt is a real sleeper, but possibly the most useful of all of ChimpIt’s capabilities.  You may find yourself shifiting more of your searches to ChimpIt even when you’re at home.

Okay, let’s take a closer look at those strange faces trailing down the right side of the screen.  Those are supposed to be “strangers nearby” but when you click on them, they seem to be from random places.  The ChimpIt team says that as more people use ChimpIt the list will become more accurate, but in the meantime, they are casting as wide a net as is necessary to fill the list.  But that begs the question–why would I want to meet strangers?  Well, if I’m at a conference or an airport lounge, that could come in handy.  After all, aren’t we the socially mobile jetset because nearly every opportunity is a networking opportunity, the never-ending mobile mixer?  Interestingly (and not surprisingly), it’s apparent that some of these strangers have already begun the process of mixing because you can see their public shout outs.  You don’t need to be a nun to know that there’s some adult friend finding going on.  This aspect gives the act of “chimping” a whole new meaning…
  
So let’s wrap up this walk-through up. ChimpIt is a notebook app, not a smartphone app, although it’s clear that it seems to bring together some of the best features of the smartphone apps and bulks them up with meatier content. You can get just about everything ChimpIt does without ChimpIt, but it’s awfully damn convenient to have the little monkey pull everything together for you automagically.  The local deals are way cool provided they’re accurate.  The optimized Google map is exactly what it should be.  The strange faces make me feel funny on the inside (I’m married) because it feels naughty even though I can tell myself I’m simply networking for business.
 
The ChimpIt folks call their new toy the best “here you are” app for notebooks.  It might well be the best update to “here you are” technology since someone stuck an arrow on a map for the very first time.  Take ChimpIt with you when you travel.  You’ll know what I mean.

ChimpIt launches at SXSW 2011

Tuesday, March 8th, 2011
ChimpIt. You are here.  Here's what's near.

ChimpIt. You are here. Here's what's near.

ChimpIt, the social location-based app  (aka “Here you are” app) for notebooks launches at this year’s SXSW in Austin, TX.  Users of ChimpIt will enjoy the benefit  ”no check-in required” as they use WiFi hotspots–ChimpIt will automatically detect their location and check-in for them.  They can optionally share their location or their experience at a location with their Facebook friends.  The benefits of checking-in or “Chimping” include:

  • Accurate nearby search results (find the nearest tacos, atm, or beer)
  • See local deals nearby (cheap eats and drinks that only locals know about)
  • Handy nearby Yelp reviews
  • Weather, news, gossip, movie listings
  • Discover and meet people nearby

Download ChimpIt and add smarts to notebook WiFi experience!

Watch the demo video here here:

http://www.chimpit.com

Chyngle and Billing Revolution on the Move

Thursday, October 15th, 2009
Chyngle: Mobile Venue Networks

Chyngle: Mobile Venue Networks

In September, we witnessed Chyngle‘s DemoPit winning pitch at TechCrunch50 and were impressed with their efforts to socially-mobilize and monetize the hyper-local venue.  They’ve decided to focus on stadiums.   We kinda like the idea of ordering junk from our seats–very convenient!  Would be nice if we could figure out a way to text the loud-mouth jerk behind us and ask him to shut up and sit down.

In August, we ran into Billing Revolution at the VC Task Force event “Mobile Monetization: Real Cash or Virtual Bucks.”  Other panelists were Hill Ferguson, VP Product Zong ; John Loschky, VP Product, Billing Revolution; Russell Tillitt, CEO, Embee Mobile; Fabio Sisinni, Director, Go to Market Mobile. Paypal.  We were very impressed with the quality of this panel–probably one of the best-qualified panels we’ve seen in a while.  Indeed, a very smart bunch of guys.  Hats off to VC Task Force.  Billing Revolution is trying to make a go of mobile billing by by-passing the carriers and keeping the money.  Unfortunately, this requires consumers to set up an account with them in advance.  PayPal obviously fought the same battle years before, but had a first move advantage.  Some would argue that it was a first move disadvantage.  Whatever the case, it seems that PayPal’s requirement to create an account is still a point of friction for many consumers and merchants.  It will be interesting to see how and if Billing Revolution can avoid these pitfalls.  Can’t really remember what Embee and Zong are up to, but that Russell Tillitt sure seemed smart.

It seems Chyngle and Billing Revolution made an appearance this month at the CTIA FundFest where they pitched a panel of 3 judges.  The judges picked Chyngle with Billing Revolution not quite snagging 2nd place.  Read Mike Demler‘s coverage of the contest here.

Layar: a tool to browse the world

Thursday, October 15th, 2009
Layas augmented reality

Laya's augmented reality

If you’re still at a loss as to the significance of augmented reality, Layar’s own explanation from inside the app explains it well: “Layar is a tool to browse the world. It enables exploration, more informed decisions, serendipity and fun. [...] While looking through the phone’s camera lens, a user can see houses for sale popular bars and shops, touristic information of the area, play a live game, etcetera.”

Layar aggregates all those little niggly bits of extra information you often wish you knew when visiting a certain new place–the best way to the train station from the point you’re standing on, where the best cafe is, and so on–and overlays it on the real world as viewed through your phone’s camera. And there is a whole lot more functionality that’s waiting to be realized. Layar’s code lets developers create their own informational overlays for the real world. As the Layar release notes, gaming is a significant potential exploit of the code, with everything from advanced geocaching treasure hunts to virtual shooters being obvious possibilities. There are all sorts of social networking uses too.

via Fast Company

LBS Apps for 2010 & Beyond

Sunday, August 2nd, 2009

WCA LogoThis month I attended my second WCA event, “On Deck–LBS Apps for 2010 & Beyond,” presented by the LBS SIG (Location Based Services Special Interest Group). For a biz dev guy, this event rated way higher than the first one I attended, Mobile SIG’s “Mobile Display Technology,” which was apparently a sweet event for the über techies of the mobile handset world.

LBS Apps for 2010 showcased some very cool apps for LBS enabled devices. Among the presenters were TourSpot, UrbanMapping, MotionMaps, DialPlus, Gokivo Navigator, zhiing, Aha, B4UGo, myGeoDiary, MADMaps, Google Latitude and geomob. NAVTEQ‘s Laura Diaz moderated the event from the famed PARC auditorium, which is apparently one big concrete bunker. I got bupkis for a signal on my Blackberry, while inside the auditorium. Nifty way to keep the phones quite during a presentation.

Interesting side note concerning PARC–I learned that in 2002, PARC was established as an independent company. After decades of giving away the coolest of technologies, PARC now seeks strategic partners to commercially monetize its innovations.

But PARC was by far the minor attraction. The presenters wowed the audience with impressive LBS smartphone gadgetry. Aha and B4UGO actually showed their products for the first time ever to the public. I found UrbanMapping, arguably one of the least sexy apps, to be among the most fascinating. What did I find so fascinating? The app can show parking data, including useful parking info for 3500 US and Canadian parking facilities–data collection at it’s finest. MotionMaps was much more the technical marvel, showing 3D maps that you can pan across and zoom in on with a mere twist of your wrist, using your device camera as a motion sensor. I should also give props to DialPlus, which brings contextually relevant caller data to your handset.

An interesting thing I’m reminded of, as I peruse the presenter websites, is that not everyone has ignored the Blackberry. In fact, I’ve seen far fewer than expected iPhones in the hands of developers at these WCA events. Perhaps the iPhone is as much (or more) an accessory as it is a truly good phone, from an LBS developer’s perspective.

This event enlightened me to the latest in LBS apps, while my last WCA event educated me to the struggles of maintaining acceptable battery life with ever increasing demands on mobile handset displays. As for WCA sponsored events, I’m looking forward to continued exploration and attendance. Obviously, LBS is highly relevant to Less Networks since we’re all about mashing up WiFi hotspots with social and LBS apps.

~roberto