BlogWorks: Facebook, Twitter Now Offer Location-Sharing Features

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March 17, 2010

Facebook, Twitter Now Offer Location-Sharing Features

By Nicole Burguess
Account Executive, New Media Relations

Social sites that ask, “What’s on your mind?” and “What’s happening?” are now asking, “Where are you?”

Location-based social networking site Foursquare celebrated its first birthday last week. With over 500,000 users and more than 15.5 million check-ins to date, the service has proven consumer demand for location-based networking tools. Hot on the heels of this trend – which has also boosted use of location services Gowalla and Loopt – Twitter and Facebook both announced they would offer similar services to users.

Twitter launched a feature that lets users tweet their locations on Foursquare’s first anniversary. PC Magazine reports, “Once enabled, the site will attempt to discover your location using Google Gears. Then a small pin icon appears on the information line of your latest tweet. Hover over it, and a Google Map pops up with your location in the middle.” This feature is currently live, and users can choose to activate it with a few clicks at Twitter.com.

Also last week, news broke of Facebook’s intent to add location-based features beginning in April. All Facebook users will soon be able to share physical locations as part of status updates. Additionally, a new set of APIs will allow App developers to use this technology in a wide variety of new Apps.

And what that means for social media community managers, marketers and strategists is a multitude of opportunities to bridge “real life” happenings with Web-based conversations. Brand-sponsored meet-ups can now be even more heavily publicized through Twitter, Facebook, Foursquare and other services as they happen. And local businesses can connect with customers in more relevant ways, boosting hyper-local social media conversations that sites like Yelp have made popular.

Concerns about privacy and security implications of disclosing one’s physical location on the Web remain, but for now all these tools require opt-in, allowing users to choose for themselves,

For more on these new innovations and other trends in location-based social networking, check out: