Did Pokémon Go just destroy Foursquare?
The first time I heard about Foursquare was from a friend who’s a social media junkie. She loved the game-like mechanics, the leveling up, the competition, and the exploration of new places. Slowly yet surely Foursquare was building up a steady amount of user data and playing the long game of getting customers in the door at brick and mortar businesses.
Since its limited release last week in just a few countries, Pokémon Go has leapfrogged Foursquare in almost every aspect. It might be only a matter of time before Foursquare becomes completely irrelevant. Let’s look at the tape.
1 — Foursquare gamifies, Pokémon Go games
The major pull for Foursquare early adopters was how much fun the app made exploring their surroundings. It made the experience of going places you’ve already been more fun and places you’d never been worth going back to. Pokemon Go is actually a game. That’s it. It forgoes trying to make life more interesting, and adds a more interesting filter.
You know what a tree looks like. Now there’s a tree with a playable character sitting in it. Who the hell wouldn’t want to go back to a water park they’ve been to so many times before to catch a Blastoise? You don’t have to take my word for it. Here’s a video of trainers “gathering” in Central Park that proves how much more compelling games are:
2 — Instant gratification for businesses
You may have heard by now the stories of stores increasing foot traffic and sales simply by dropping Pokémon lures that trainers flock to. Foursquare has been trying to convince these same types of shops of the value of this effect that also occurs from their app. Niantic has leapfrogged them and gone straight to the monetization phase. They have small pizzerias making in-app purchases, some Walmarts doing the same, and soon a brand partnership with McDonald’s. What’s the difference? Instant tangible results that businesses can’t get enough of. There’s no sales pitch necessary. This “geolocation ads” use-case for their in-app purchases actually sold itself.
3 — Novelty & Nostalgia: the ultimate power couple
The ultimate advantage that Pokémon Go has over Foursquare is the combination of a powerful cultural phenomenon applied to new tech. Anyone who thinks this is big because AR, clearly doesn’t know jack shit about Pokémon. When I was in elementary school, IT WAS FRICKIN HUGE. As kids we used our cards, our imaginations and role played and dreamed of what it would be like to actually go out and catch em’ all just like Ash, Misty, and Brock. Now you can actually, kind of sort of, do it! On your Phone! IRL! Foursquare always had the novelty but none of the deeper meaning behind it that Go has. It’s an obvious example of the difference between creating a nice product and creating one that makes people feel something.
With these 3 factors it’s easy to see why Pokémon Go is doing so well in both popularity and revenue. Oh, and it’s not even officially released worldwide yet. It’s also becoming apparent that Foursquare didn’t go far enough in gamifying actions to get the average person to engage with their app. How much more gamified can you get than an actual game? Now with rumors that Grand Theft Auto might release its own AR game, it might only be a matter of time before these types of games crowd Foursquare out of the geolocation app market altogether. Is it too late for them to pivot?
