New Media
Golden Corral Cary and Location-Based Goodness
by Bobby McDonald on 05/26/2010
It's no secret. The location-based craze has begun. Foursquare and Gowalla are the giants in the room, but Facebook is getting into the game and TriOut, a local addition to the set, is doing great things to provide value to local businesses and their customers. We've been lucky enough to begin working with the operators of Platinum Corral (yep, they're a client). They're a Golden Corral franchise with 26 of those tasty buffets to their name who have caught the location-based fever.
They've been watching (and searching) Raleigh's social media scene for the past year or so and wanted to try something new in the social space to promote their Cary location. We decided on a location-based contest that rewarded people for check-ins in a variety of different ways. All of the details are on their Facebook page, but the basic benefits for customers who check-in are that:
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The Foursquare mayor eats for free. Brian McDonald, @bmcd67, is the current Foursquare mayor, and he can really put it away, so we'll see if anyone can catch up with him
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Any Foursquare, Gowall or TriOut check-in has a 1 in 5 chance of eating for free.
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Each check-in enters you in for a chance to win a 16GB Wi-Fi iPad.
The contest is going well so far, and I'll follow up in July with a summary of how everything turned out and, of course, who won the iPad!
What do you think? Do the above discounts/giveaways present enough value for your check-in? Tell us what you think in the comments or holler at Golden Corral Cary on Twitter @GC_Cary.
Can't get enough local location-based news or just want to read more about the evolution of the services? @MediaTwo_Social (@MorganSiem) and @WayneSutton have written excellent posts on the subject recently. Follow the links below to check them out:
Rewarding Foursquare Mayors Nationwide discusses Starbucks national Foursquare push, the difficulties involved and what this means for location based services.
The value of the check in using location based services for businesses and customers. Time to measure those check-ins. grabs some of the questions from the comment in the post above and discusses each in detail.
Photo Source: Geek and Poker
Brian McDonald said...
WOW I feel honored not only being the Mayor but also be named in your blog! Great campaign, let’s see if I can be dethroned!
May 26, 2010
Bobby McDonald said...
Thanks for the comment Brian! Foursquare been playing with their alg. for mayorship adding more emphasis for recent check-ins. It will be interesting to see if that plays out here.
May 26, 2010