Location based everything – that is what we can expect from mobile in the coming months.

As a business, you’ll want to understand how customers are using mobile to interact with their environment. 
Start now to learn what you can do to foster a new kind of relationship – one that is based on the location of your customers. 

The equation that gets everyone so excited about mobile is:  power  + size + connectivity. It adds up to creating a different kind
of connection with your customers.  Why should you care now?  Your customers will quickly come to expect a new relationship with
your business – via mobile, they are visiting you on various mobile platforms already.  Check your mobile web traffic to see that they
are indeed visiting you now.

What's driving this?

A Smartphone is  a ‘handheld computer’.  with full operating systems, powerful processors and abundant memory –  
just like your desktop computer.  The payoff is, they are connected to the Internet and have global positioning information,
which changes the game.  Today the features on the ‘phone’ that enable interacting with your environment include the
Global Positioning System, the camera, and even WiFi.  Mobile web tools continue to evolve. Very soon new chips will ship
in Smartphones that will revolutionize how customers interact at the point of sale, and will change the stakes for credit card businesses.

Your mobile web audience will come to expect a locationship with your brand - when they want to interact.

What’s pushing the model? 

Over the past year the “social, local, mobile” revolution has taken center stage.  Termed "SoLoMo" by VC, John Doer   –  
SOcial for its role in maintaining always-on connections with friends, events and activities, LOcal for its ability to gain relevance
from location and real time activity and MObile for its ubiquitous.  Platforms like FourSquare, Gowalla and Facebook Places  are
changing the way that businesses interact with customers.   Mobile platforms are the enabling technology. 

Marketer’s have been the first to test out location based services, such as “texting” to get a coupon or reward, location generated
deals and even WiFi is used to micro-broadcast special discounts.  As your brand begins to build trust with mobile web readers,
there are a whole new set of ideas for you to create “Locationships”.

Some Early Ideas To Consider:

Help them find you:

Store locator –  using Global Positioning Satellites (GPS) this is application that is available now via mobile websites. 
You can create a mobile website that includes store locator today.

Run promotions that get engagement, nearby:

Use 2-D Barcodes (QR Codes) to engage customers in store, or with your product itself.  Use them in print ads to drive mobile
web audience to your website.  Bridge the gap between online and in store purchasing.

Xtify, Placecast and Location Labs have introducing  “geo-fencing” technologies that retailers can incorporate into apps to track
when customers are near stores and try to entice them with special offers or discounts.  Xtify and Location Labs rely on a phone's
GPS technology, while Placecast uses carrier cell towers for location.

Location Based Commerce:

Shop.org showed that about 2% of online retail sales were coming from mobile, and this percentage is climbing fast.

Location-based commerce is an evolution of mobile commerce that leverages the known location of the consumer to drive
engagement with mobile shopping applications relative to a known location or retail store.  A second-quarter 2010 survey
showed that 6% of U.S. mobile users had used a shopping app in the last three months, and 12% said they planned to use
their phones to find or redeem coupons during the holiday season.

Loyalty Programs

Some apps like Shopkick are triggered when users enter a store, awarding them points toward a purchase just for walking in.
After launching last fall at retailers including Macy's and Best Buy, Shopkick said this month its app had 750,000 users

Your mobile web audience is getting very comfortable using these new features, it is time to begin testing various mobile web
platforms to engage your customers in a new way and to create Locationships!