Foursquare on Monday made available to all colleges and university badges previously reserved only for those institutions that partnered with the location-based service.
It’s a growth strategy long overdue and, perhaps, past its prime.
Foursquare previously partnered with 100 universities across the country and made certain badges available to them. It’s a welcome sign to see those badges being released now to every other institution.
The five badges — Bookworm Bender, Quad Squatter, Smells Like School Spirit, Munchies, and Campus Explorer — should be another draw for students looking to join the game. But it’s not all about badges.
Foursquare is looking for students to sign up for its new Foursquare Ambassador program. The company explains how it works:
- You sign up here if you love foursquare;
- We give you easy ways to help make foursquare more fun and better for everyone.
- You tell us how we can make foursquare better on your campus
- You get to rep for foursquare. And earn our undying love! (and probably t-shirts and stickers and all sorts of other fun stuff)
It sounds like a great deal for students already excited about Foursquare, but the value to higher education marketers may be limited.
I don’t want to be down on Foursquare, but as a marketer I have yet to see the numbers justify the time and energy I’ve put into it. Foursquare only recently topped 6 million users, a far cry from the 175 million on Twitter and 500+ million on Facebook. A few free badges aren’t going to get Fourquare into the same arena.
Yet I still love checking in, earning badges and challenging friends for mayorships. So perhaps its time for me to let go and recognize Foursquare for what it is: a game. Some things are meant to be fun, let them be.
Here’s a quick rundown of the badges now available at a campus near you:
- Bookworm Bender: Looks like you’re throwing a late night bender at the library. Ain’t no party like a Pythagorean Theorem party!
- Quad Squatter: That’s your 10th check-in at the Quad. Either you’re majoring in Botany, or you just gave up on class altogether.
- Smells Like School Spirit: Woah! That’s your 5th check-in showing your school pride. You’re a super fan! Now remember to wash off that face paint before you go to bed – huge mistake!
- Munchies: That’s 5 check-ins at campus dining halls. You must be a Grilled Cheese connoisseur. You deserve a TV Show!
- Campus Explorer: You’ve travelled far and wide to explore every corner of campus – all without getting scurvy. Magellan’s got nothing on you!
The important thing about the badges is that you have to have your venues properly categorized in order to activate them. “All campus badges unlock based on the venue’s primary category being under College and Education,” according to Foursquare.
More details on the secondary categories:
For Campus Explorer, you need “10 check-ins to *different* venues around campus (and category)
For Munchies, the venues must be categorized as “cafeteria”
For School Spirit, the venues must be categorized as “stadium”
For Bookworm, venues must be categorized as “library”
For Quad Squatter, venues must be categorized as “quad/commons”
This info is quoted from material Foursquare shares with you when you become a university partner.
Thanks for the add, Georgy! Great information. You have a good number of students actually earning the badges?
Patrick, we JUST got this set up, so we’ll have to wait and see!
You hit the nail on the head with your acknowledgment of the gaming core that is Foursquare, but there is a natural extension to marketing and that is the common ground of experience. What Foursquare does well is to promote experiences (e.g. – the tips provided by users), and that is what college should be about. Academic and social experiences that craft you into something you yourself may not have even imagined.
Marketing new experiences, even to those who *think* they already know all there is to know about a campus and its life, is surely a worthwhile venture. When done well, it can be very satisfying.