Loud and Clear

As one of the early adopters of Foursquare, I am always super excited when they launch a new service — particularly one that can help businesses with their marketing.

If you manage a venue on Foursquare you will hopefully be as excited as I am about the news that Foursquare venue managers can now create their own events through the admin dashboard.

You don’t even need to be a superuser (although I am). No, all you need to do is have administrative access to a venue. This could be the business that you own or work at, it could be a client that you help with marketing, or, it could be a friend that you introduced to Foursquare.

The first step to creating a venue is claiming one. If you haven’t done so, start by searching for the venue in Explore. Once you find the proper venue page, click the text link that says “Claim here” in the lower right hand corner.

Next you will go through a series of steps to verify the business is yours. (It doesn’t take long.) I recommend that you use the new express verification method which allows you to claim over the phone for a small fee of just one dollar.

Once you have access to the venue, start by making sure all the information is correct, link the appropriate Facebook and Twitter accounts to the page, upload a logo or other profile picture that represents the business, and so on. After you’ve done all that, go ahead and click on the “Tools” button. Scrolling down the page you will notice there is an area that lets you add events.

Adding an event is rather simple at this point. There are no categories; you simply include the name of the event, date and time. Enter that information and click save. You can schedule multiple events at once.

Currently there is no edit option. If you mess up on a detail in the event creation process you will have to delete it and start over again.

So, what is the benefit of creating an event on Foursquare? Events show up in the explore filter with a small red “show” icon next to them. When a user searches for nearby venues to check-in to, they will see that there’s an event at a place. They might even be swayed to go there. When the user checks into the venue they also have the option of checking into the specific events. So, for example, my Foursquare friends will see that not only am I at Fused Interactive, I am there for the Off Sale Podcast recording.

The additional information helps add context to your check-ins, thus making the user experience even better and adding a bit of “free” publicity for special events.

Foursquare has many opportunities that business owners can tap into. Check out their new website that Foursquare has devoted entirely to case studies and tutorials for new business owners just getting started with Foursquare.

Also read my post on Foursquare South Dakota about Foursquare Events.