Facebook Places Deals to target local business ads in UK and Europe | Technology. Facebook made a significant move into the potentially lucrative local business advertising space on Monday with the launch in the UK and other European countries of Places Deals, which gives users discounts and benefits with nearby shops, restaurants and venues through their mobile phones. Launched in the US last November, Facebook Deals lets users 'check in' to venues via the Places feature on its mobile app for iPhone, Android and through facebook.com on some smartphones. Facebook says millions of users are already choosing to check in to venues, and its app is already the most popular in Apple's iTunes Store. More than 250 million people use Facebook every day from a membership of more than 500 million worldwide, and more than one third of those access the site through mobile.
Mazda, Yo! Sushi, Usher and Alton Towers also announced offers, while Argos and Benetton are donating to charity with a set number of checkins. Placecast. O2 launches location-based mobile advertising with Placecast. Placecast is a provider of location-based advertising that we’re great fans of here at GoMo News – because it uses opt-in SMS to power the ads. No one needs a smartphone to use this service. And today we can reveal that UK operator O2 has signed an important contract to re-sell Placecast services as a white label service to clients in the UK. We spoke to Placecast CEO Alistair Goodman to get some more details. What does Placecast do? Placecast works around “geo-fencing”.
What’s the O2 deal? O2 have licensed Placecast’s geo-fencing technology for a 1 million customer trial in the UK. The technology has been working well in the States – as you can see in our report on the Placecast deal with Location Labs. The company will be working differently here than in the States – in America, Placecast interacts with brands directly. For O2 UK customers, they just need to head to www.o2more.co.uk, fill in some demographic details and register for the service. What are the launch campaigns? Loopt. Loopt to tap potential of mobile location based advertising. Loopt, the mobile phone based friend finder service, is preparing to launch a new location based mobile advertising system that will be able to target consumers based on where they are.
The Reward Alerts technology uses tracking features in modern mobiles to locate users and Loopt then sends advertisements and coupons for nearby businesses. Customers using the Loopt app on their apple or android device will be instantly notified of any deals or sales in their area. To receive alerts, customers simply have to download the application to their phone. Then, when they find an offer they like, users can present that offer with its unique code at the appropriate business. “Reward Alerts represent one more step in a direction we see as really important for location-based services – making mobile more simple and real-time,” said Sam Altman, co-founder and chief executive of Loopt.
The service is already live for local businesses but Loopt plans to start working with national brands from March 11. Places. Gowalla. Study: Spending on Location-Based Ads Will Reach $1.8B in 2015 - Technorati Advertising. In the real estate industry, the mantra “Location, location, location” looms large. Pretty soon, that refrain may be much more commonplace in the advertising world. A new study by technology research firm ABI Research predicts that businesses worldwide will spend $1.8 billion on location-based advertising—think Foursquare and Facebook Places—in 2015 as a slice of their mobile marketing budgets.
That’s up from the $42.8 million projected for 2010. It’s still early in the location-based game, and there’s no “right approach” to location-based advertising, said Neil Strother, practice director at ABI Research. “This remains a very fragmented market that is full of experimentation,” he said. Among major advertisers that have experimented with location-based campaigns are McDonald’s, Pepsi, H&M, Chili’s and Starbucks.
Loopt has more than 4 million registered users; MyTown, about 2.5 million; Foursquare, more than 2 million; and Gowalla, more than 300,000. Google Secures Broad Patent for Location-Based Advertising. Google, the world's largest search engine and the owner of the world's largest online advertising platform, has been granted a major U.S. patent for "determining and/or using location information in an ad system. " In other words, Google now owns a key patent for location-based advertising. The patent, which was first discovered by Venturebeat, was filed nearly seven years ago, in September 2003, but was only granted last week.
Since then of course, location-based advertising has boomed with companies such as AdMob (acquired by Google) and Quattro Wireless (acquired by Apple) leading the charge. That patent itself focuses on making sure businesses can better target their ads based on location information so that they can do things such as price arbitration (e.g. figuring out prices for items near you and getting the best deal).
It also deals with the user interface and defining geographic areas. This is the second major tech patent to surface this week. Foursquare Partners Up. Are Location-Based Ads on Foursquare's Radar? JiWire. The Leading Mobile Audience Media Channel & Wi-Fi Advertising Network. Location-Based Mobile Advertising Company JiWire Raises $20 Million. Exclusive: Location-based mobile advertising company JiWire has raised $20 million in new funding led by Trident Capital with Comcast Interactive Capital, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Panorama Capital, and Norwest Venture Partners also participated in the financing.
With the current funding, JiWire’s total capital raised to date is $45 million. JiWire offers a highly targeted, location-based advertising platform that runs across Wi-Fi and mobile for devices such as iPads, smartphones and laptops. Through partnerships with more than 40 public WiFi networks, 30,000 venues and 60 airports, its ads reach more than 40 million people a month. JiWire also has advertising relationships with more than 200 location-based mobile applications. On the advertising side, the company has partnered with a number of companies to connect these brands with its massive consumer reach. For example, JiWire announced a deal with Groupon to offer location-based deals at a hyperlocal level.
Home | Poynt. Poynt Corporation Awarded Location-Based Advertising Patent for Delivering Coupons and Offers. Patent Provides Poynt Corp. with Industry Leading Intellectual Property and Protection Covering the Delivery of Mobile Coupons and Offers CALGARY, ALBERTA--(Marketwire - Jan. 12, 2011) - Poynt Corporation (TSX VENTURE:PYN) ("Poynt Corp. " or the "Company"), a leading provider of mobile local search services, announces issuance of a third patent in the Company's portfolio of patents, claiming priority before the year 2000, for delivering location-based offers and coupons to mobile smartphones based on GPS location and user profile. The new patent marks an important protective feature and barrier to entry for competitors of the Company's location-based search model, allowing for the delivery of location-based, personalized offers and automated notification of those offers.
"The services surrounding this patent have been, and will continue to be, a key revenue driver for the Company," said Andrew Osis, CEO, Poynt Corp. About Poynt Corporation Poynt Corp.