This week, we wanted to highlight a few more apps from one of our Sprint video projects.  These apps are pretty popular. If you have time, download them from the Android market today!

Rhapsody – Build a virtual playlist and listen to all the music you want with Rhapsody.  This service is 10$ a month and streams music to an app that is downloaded on your phone.

Identify songs fast with SoundHound.  Read lyrics, watch videos, and share songs with this awesome app.

Use Foursquare to check into your favorite local spots and build a social network that revolves around exploring the world!  Compete for the ultimate title of “mayor” by checking in the most!

Twitter is great for getting a ton of updates all on one feed.  Download this app to your phone to keep up to date with trending topics and daily happenings.  If you haven’t joined this microblog service, you’re missing out on the fun!

What apps are you using? Share them below! 

Everyone loves checking in to Foursquare, and leaving tips about their favorite or not so favorite places.  Yelp is the premier source for local business reviews.  But, what about an app that allows you to personally thank a service worker that went above and beyond.  We&Co is a social media platform/app that allows you to show your appreciation by more than a big tip.  We can see the endless possibilities of this app: employee of the month anyone?

The interface is stylish; build up someone’s Thankometer to show how great they were.  Keep track of your favorite people and build a customer relationship with them.  Search for locations and add an employee yourself.  The app allows you to work up to different levels of familiarity with the more thanks that you give.  When you thank someone, the app has a cool button that you press and a short animation swirl happens afterwards.  This feature makes the app more gratifying.  This app is proof that social media is bringing the world closer together.

Head over to the app store and get this one for free! Build customer loyalty for yourself and others with We&Co.  (None of the apps we review are paying us to do it).

Got an app you’d like to see us review? Email us: austin@bars-tone.com or share it in the comment box below!

By: Justin Gonzalez

justin@bars-tone.com

@justinSF

You may have heard that in its next mobile app update, Yelp will be bringing local deals to it’s users. Tech Crunch just wrote a very excited article about it beating Groupon Now “out of the gate” but I honestly don’t see how it’s fundamentally better than any other Daily/Local Deal app.

Call me a fanboy but my initial thought was, “How is this better than Foursquare Specials for business?”

One advantage the TC article cites Yelp as having over Groupon is simply the size of its user base. If we’re going to get excited about Yelp having 4.5 million monthly users, what about Foursquare’s recent 10 million mark? Correct me if I’m wrong but that’s more than double the amount of users… or am I bad at math?

In my opinion, a model like Foursquare Specials will have much longer lasting value for business marketers than jumping into a daily deal promotion. Because Foursquare Specials are about check-ins (that are then pushed out to a users social networks) and not fleeting moments of discounted goods, they have a sticky effect that is essential to building one’s business.

Sure, in the short run you sell a ton of half-priced pizzas with the hope that these people will come back. But you’re completely forgetting the 80/20 rule you learned in Marketing 101: 80% of your business comes from 20% of your customers. Those 20% are the people that are also religiously checking-in to your business to become the Mayor and deserve something in return. It’s basic customer loyalty…

You can tell me that Yelp has acquired such a vast amount of user reviews, ratings and more… But the app doesn’t tap into my friend network like Foursquare does to recommend locations based on where my friends and I have been. The value of a good review on Yelp is no doubt beneficial, but a review from my friends carries such greater value than that of a stranger.

Ultimately, my suggestion would be to get into the check-in specials game before jumping head first into daily deals. Unless in some miraculous way you really think you’ll turn a profit by paying out a third-party app to give its users a deal. Do you see where I’m going with this?

I just don’t see the long-term value for brands using daily deals, but then again neither does this super intelligent guy who has been working with “local products since 1995″. Wait, was that a Tech Crunch article I just cited that was trashing the future of daily deals? Woops!

This is an op-ed piece and the opinions expressed in this article are that of the author alone.

By: Justin Gonzalez

justin@bars-tone.com

@justinSF

Let’s face it – no matter what kind of office culture you foster, work can sometimes get boring. If you have a big project that’s taking up all of your time, or not enough projects to fill the day, hitting 3:00 and realizing you have three more hours to go can be a harsh reality. So, I’m here to help you make work more fun using social media!

First, let me say that I can’t take credit for the idea of gamification, which came from a presentation by Charlene Li at an SF American Marketing Association meeting about a month ago that I just can’t seem to get out of my head. It might be safe to say that I’m obsessed with it. So I’ve decided to explore it further and throw out some ideas for how corporations, big and small, can make work more fun while gaining some social influence as well.

Foursquare: Group projects can be tough. They involve coordinating time, sharing the workload and credit for the end result. So why not turn it into a competition? As new projects are brought on, you can create a special check in location for those working on the project. When a person is working on their portion of the project they check-in to the location whether they’re at their desk or in a group meeting. I think using the tips part of Foursquare can be left to personal preference, but you can use it to establish who is doing what for the project (“John will complete the proposal by Friday”) and check off when these tasks have been completed. Or, you can just use it to trash talk. The idea here is that people within the group are competing to become the Mayor of that project, and every check-in gets them one step closer to being the mayor. At the project’s end, the last person established as Mayor wins the race and maybe gets lunch on the boss. Or lunch with the boss.

Instagram: Many offices put tons of time and energy into creating a place that’s fun to go to, and employees appreciate the niceties of Wii consoles, foosball and ping pong tables. Instagram offers a fun way for people to share the uniqueness of their office life with their social networks. In fact, I’d be willing to bet people in your company already do this on their own time. The idea is simple: send out an e-mail blast to your employees with a few specific hashtags (#thatslifeatGAP could be an example) and encourage them to use these in posts on Twitter, Foursquare and the like that are shared through Instagram. I know I can’t be the only person using Instagram that shares photos to my Foursquare, Twitter and Facebook accounts. Imagine the added social influence you can foster if you got all of your employees on board with the same hashtag – while simultaneously showing off your fun side.

Bump: Here at BARS+TONE we spend a lot of time sharing things via e-mail, but imagine if everyone on your team was connected via their mobile device instead of tied down to their computer all day long. Using an application like Bump, not only can you text (think e-mail) your coworkers for free, but it’s so much cooler than e-mail. On top of that, you can share calendars, music, links etc… everything you do with e-mail, but a more appealing interface. This obviously assumes that everyone on your team has an i-something device, but it’s cool to think about. I don’t know about you, but being stuck in front of my computer for 8 hours is not pleasant.

In the end, I think that social media can offer companies more than just customer service assistance and sales opportunities – it can be huge for employee retention and satisfaction as well. I’d be interested to hear what people have to say about these ideas or if they know of any companies that are currently doing this. What do you think? Does social media have a place within office culture?

By: Justin Gonzalez

justin@bars-tone.com

@justinSF

I signed up for a Facebook account after a Summer Program at Boston University. It was a great way for me to stay in touch with all the friends I had made, and would continue to make in my college career. In the beginning we shared photos, notes and even poked each other back and forth… Well, that was some time ago and we all know what has happened to Facebook since… restrictions were lifted and brands joined in on the fun.

When I first saw Judy Shapiro’s post on AdAge, Has Facebook Jumped the Shark?, I was thrilled to see someone voicing their opinion against the social media giant (you go girl!). I think she makes some really great points, especially her connection between Clay Shirky’s work and the potential implosion of Facebook.

My response to her article is this: Facebook has lost its roots in social networking and has allowed itself to become littered with advertisements, promotions and guerilla marketing tools disguised as features. Ultimately, I believe Facebook will be confronted with the same issue advertisers faced with the introduction of the DVR – consumers will soon become overwhelmed by the marketing promotions they are bombarded with on a platform that is supposed to be social, not promotional and seek ways to avoid interaction with them. I see features like Places and Deals becoming an annoyance to those who use Facebook to keep in touch with friends and family, not get a discount.

Clearly Facebook needs to raise funds to maintain its staff and servers, so growth is inevitable and essential. As Eric talked about in his post last month, Facebook has clearly, “had an eye on the rapid growth of geo-loco pioneer Foursquare”. Weighing in at over 500 million active users, versus FourSquare’s 4 million, it seems obvious that overlapping users will be more apt to utilizing the Facebook Places feature and pushing their locations out to a larger audience rather than signing onto Foursquare to check in – essentially making applications like Foursquare obsolete.

I should add that my experience with social sites relies heavily on my experience with Facebook. I’m so inclined to use Facebook that in spite of my initial enthusiasm behind other platforms like FourSquare, it’s the one app that I use religiously. I’ve tried getting into apps like FourSquare, anticipating check-in’s throughout San Francisco and eventually becoming the Mayor of the 38-Geary Bus – but it’s never happened. Why? Because I know 18 people on FourSquare and over 500 on Facebook. Including my mom. The expectation that I’m going to log onto multiple accounts to let (the same) people know where I’m at seems silly to me. I’d rather spend the extra time getting 3-Stars on all the levels of Angry Birds.

The difference between the two platforms is that FourSquare hasn’t lost the social aspect; you aspire to become a mayor, leave tips and earn badges whereas Facebook’s feature is about… checking in? Introducing features that seemingly have little to no interactive purpose on a platform that is meant to be social tangles the experience for the user. Facebook is supposed to be a social site, not the Penny Saver.

If Facebook has “jumped the shark,” it happened when it started introducing empty features that benefit the marketer, not the consumer. I don’t know that Facebook will ever “implode” on itself, but I think it will see a backlash from users once they realize that Places isn’t for their social engagement, but for promotional targeting. It’s all fine and dandy (and totally necessary) for Facebook to monetize itself, but introducing features that don’t even compete with applications like Foursquare seems a little premature.

I totally believe in Facebook’s ability to remain relevant, but would like to see it utilize its gargantuan power for the good of the user – is that too naïve?

Written by: Eric Steckel
eric@bars-tone.com

This past Wednesday, Facebook announced Deals, its new approach to making Places a more engaging feature.  With its 500 million users and over 100 million mobile users, Facebook is hoping to make check-ins a popular thing.   Emarketer’s Debbie Williamson said “checking in is another one of those behaviors that Facebook can easily put toward mass acceptance.”

Of course, when it rolled out Places, Facebook had an eye on the rapid growth of geo-loco pioneer Foursquare.  However, since the launch of Places, Foursquare’s growth has surged, as it reached 4 million users on October 21st.  By integrating a new Deals program, which is based on opportunities to save money when checking into places, Facebook adds a level of engagement to Places that will allow it to better compete with Foursquare.   Facebook is counting on the fact that Americans like a good deal.  The success of group-buying sites such as Groupon would support that assertion.  Places will enable marketers to provide a special offer or reward when a consumer is at or near the point of sale.  “Engage with my good deal” you can hear them thinking.

Facebook is launching this new feature with brands such as Gap, McDonald’s, Starbucks, H&M and Chipotle, which gives Facebook an immediate groundswell of interest.  If they continue to offer compelling deals that reach people while they are in the proximity, Deals can be a great service, especially for lower-ticket items like a burger or a cup o’ joe.  Will it really work for Gap?  Gap plans to give away 10,000 pairs of pants to people who check-in to a Gap store.  If I’m in the hood already, I might just take them up on that, maybe even buy a pair of boxers while I’m there.  In short, if the deal is good enough, consumers will buy-in, and maybe even buy more.

We are also curious how brands work with their brick-and-mortar retail outlets- the Macy’s and WalMarts of the world- in tying a third-party “place” to a good “deal.”  Will this work for higher ticket items, like housewares, sold in a larger department store such as Macy’s?  This creates a great opportunity for a brand to help drive traffic to a brick-and-mortar retailer, which benefits both parties and strengthens that relationship.

Whatever the case, this feature allows marketers to engage with their target consumer through the social media behemoth itself.  As Williamson noted, Facebook wants to be all things to all people.  However, some of their offerings are not as sophisticated or engaging as their more specialized competitors.  If that’s the case, marketers have the opportunity to make Places a more sophisticated, engaging environment through deals, rewards and other affinity offerings.

Sources:

Emarketer, Mashable and Facebook

Written by: Enrique Zabala & Eric Steckel

enrique@bars-tone.com / eric@bars-tone.com

First off, congratulations to the San Francisco Giants, the 2010 World Series Champs.  They have brought a lot of joy to the city over the decades, and none more than during the last month as they drove to the playoffs and an eventual championship.  With the Giants win last night, the city of San Francisco went to the streets to “celebrate” its first World Series Championship.  The streets were teeming with “euphoric” fans.  In some cases, the spontaneous party crossed into rowdiness and rioting.  It seems that some folks had a different idea of a good time.

Oddly, big media outlets in the Bay Area and across the country largely failed to cover these important events.  This morning, The San Francisco Chronicle called it “joyful mayhem” which falls somewhere short of a riot, in case you were scoring at home.  MSNBC.com, CNN.com and FoxNews.com failed to report these events at the time.  However, as San Francisco is the epicenter of Social Media, Twitter, Facebook, Foursquare and Flickr were burning up with the trending topic.  #SFRiot and #SFRiots hashtags were created on Twitter after reports of looting in the Mission district were announced.  Users even had the possibility to check-in to different riots in San Francisco.  As David Brown asks on Yahoo Sports, “Were they doing it so they could become mayor of a riot, or as a public service? Just to prove they were there if something awful happened?”

Eventually, mainstream media caught the scent and followed the story.  Of course, this is not the first time that pictures and news about rapidly changing current events were getting to us faster via Social Media than on TV and online news.  The news cycle gets ever more rapid, and we are experiencing a shift in how and from whom we get our news.   Again, this is nothing new.  However, it seems to me that if the traditional news agencies want to maintain their tenuous toe-hold on journalism, they should not cede ground to citizen journalists by simply ignoring a major story.  The riots don’t go away or cease to have existed if you fail to report on them.  Some folks on Twitter and Facebook will be sure of that!