If you’ve ever used one of the Location-based apps like Foursquare, Gowalla or Brightkite, you’ve gone through the steps of checking in to a location to earn some sort of reward for being there. Now that these early-stage start-ups have proven the interest in Location-based Services, Twitter and Facebook want in (joining Google, Apple and Nokia in trying to figure out how knowing a users’ location can lead to major mobile ad revenue.)

In 2010, in the least, we’ll see both Twitter and Facebook’s take on LBS, a smart move for both companies which are experiencing massive mobile access growth. Facebook, which according to a new comScore report saw access to its mobile browser grow by 112% in the past year, is expected to add location sharing in its users’ News Feeds, which may more than just intrude on the smaller companies’ courts.

An article yesterday in the New York Times cited sources saying that Facebook would announce the news at its F8 developer conference in April. Meanwhile, Twitter, which saw access to its mobile browser explode 347% in the past year, is already testing out a geolocation feature, which some users have seen in various beta forms as they go about their tweets. Foursquare, still a solid player in the game, will offer a free analytics tool and dashboard to give business owners information and stats about their visitors. These days, there isn’t a company in the consumer mobile space that isn’t interested in Location-based Services, and the market is ripe for innovation. Knowing where users are is one of the most useful pieces of data available for mobile marketing. Mobile advertising and marketing companies like 1020 Placecast, which send customers offers on their phones when they are near a brick-and-mortar store of a brand they’ve opted to receive messages from, go about the mobile marketing in a different way then would a Facebook, Twitter, or Foursquare.
For the social media upstarts of the world, especially Facebook and Twitter, the audience is much wider. For Facebook, the largest social network with over 400 million users who are mostly connected to their real-life friends and family, users will be most likely to share where they are at any given moment. On the other hand, the type of person willing to share their location with the masses on Twitter and Foursquare is still a rare breed. That breed may still be valuable to target and for marketers, but Facebook has the opportunity to offer Location-based Services to a much larger audience, and as always they will try their best to appease privacy and business needs.
Also in the game, big mobile players Google, Apple and Nokia are also working on understanding where advertising dollars and mobile location meet. Apple is looking to use its GPS data for mobile advertising and Nokia is a key player in the international LBS market with their Ovi maps coming integrated with their phones for free. Google is trying desperately to get its social Buzz going, but it’s struggling to find the sweet spot in social media. TechCrunch states “It’s a mess,” and for the time being, I agree. However, Google’s Location-based Advertising patent won earlier this month may help them in the long run if they can ever get their buzz going. Filed six years ago, the patent is fairly broad. It covers using location for targeting, setting a minimum price bid for an ad, offering performance analytics, and modifying the content of an ad.

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Actually a lot of work has been done to secure the WordPress blogs and with a littel
discipline in using the advises You get from the WP community world You might have
a barely no secure problems with Your blog  for good.

With more than 4 million downloads of Wordpress somebody also tried to make a
business out of helping people to secure their blogs. But if You were available to create
Your blog You will also easily cope with this security thing and why pay for information
that is free :

Here is my recommendation links where You find all You need to secure Your WP blog:

1. Catswhocode>  – gives You 10 ways to secure Your WP blog !
2. Wordpress.org>  - the WP´s own recommendations
3. Enzine article>  – another good interesting article with 7 steps to secure Your WP

Have a WP secured – and nice day !
Christian Taasti

I am currently working on mobile friendly website solutions. From being a rather hot gadget “thing”
to have a so called Web 2,0 and mobile friendly website, I found that it is rather normal 
to see it as a ”must” , or at least to prepare to get it soon in most of the service minded industries I know.

Its not only a fact that it can expand Your market dramatically if You get a mobile friendly web solution.
Mobile friendly websites is a part of the Web 2,0 wave that have taken us all with storm. So far we all know
about blogs, social medias, podcasting , tagging ……twitter …..facebook ect. But from using those from our
Laptops or PC´s we are now going to get access to those things with a range of other devices starting with
our mobile phones. And from beeing something we mostly would use  in our lunchbreaks as entertainment
the devices has been under close observance from the innovative industry people who see the commecial
perspectives in the new devices combined with the changes in peoples needs and behavior.

From a company point of view it makes a lot of interesting and flexible technologies and tools available for 
the company to use for its website and for all other information going in and out.
With Web 2,0 implementation, new doors can opens for Your business and You will be able to give a far better
service and be able to scale Your business in new ways and in new markets. 

What I do is that I analyze and define the behavior of the customers, suppliers and employees
in the company and compare with  ”future behavior estimates”  of  using  new communication devices.
Based on a 3, 5 and up to 10 years behavior forecast, I am able together with the company management
to create a strategy about how to prepare, develope and meet new demands in communication from the
different parties around  the company.
The main purpose with my work is to make a strategy about how the company communicate most effectively
with the world around them. But I discovered that in most cases it also have some other beneficial side
effects. One example is that it simply can lower the number of complains to use mobile text alerts about
a product maintenance. And It really make sense to be aware of the customers permanent changing use of
communication devices.

A lot has happen since the only communication tool between the company and the client was a land
line telephone. Now when clients get new communication devices with new features in their hands,
the expectations to the companies service and response time is growing as the market absorbing 
the new devices.

 Just to mention a few ad vantages that already proves that it make sense for most companies to have a
“mobile device web strategy”  - there is mobile payment that currently extend its functionality.
Then the  SMS marketing now used more as a service to the client and then the
mobile tower created information service, where You can reach Your client when he enter 
a specified local area. 
But this is just a few features among many fast developing business and communication tools and
they grow rapidly in use  !

To create a 3WC – mobile friendly website You can take a look at the Basic guidelines that is a first
step to build in Your future communication strategy for Your business. Another pretty interesting
exercise You can do is to check Your existing web solution: Check how mobile friendly Your websites is

The use of the world wide web in the future will be much more flexible and the data networks will be reachable  
from a range of new devices , more useful and more flexible than the good “old” mobile phone and 
the Laptops.  
Its already started and it changes Your clients behavior faster than You can imagine. If You simply
want to stay in touch and improve Your business with Your existing clients You better get on the train now.

To be competitive in a time where interaction become more flexible the companies that are aware of the
importance of a mobile web strategy will be able to follow their clients needs and interactive behavior
as it changes. That will make a company able to keep their clients and even expanding their business relation.
The ones who do not understand this will not be loosing their clients because of their products fails, but because their
communication skills does !

/ Christian Taasti

See this site in a mobile friendly version >

Other related articles I can recommend to read :

 Does social media kill communication-and people skills ?

Should mobile marketing replace people with devices ?

Maddock Douglas writing about 4G > 

If You want to study Web 2,0 more intense, Poul Anderson from JISC made this fine report >