The timing of the release was a smart move, because Foursquare was really able to hit the ground running in 2009 because of the heavy adoption and integration with SXSW.
Here's the basic breakdown of what you need to know about Foursquare 3.0:
- Exploring your options: Replacing the 'Tips' tab, a new 'Explore' tab offers recommendations to users, broken down into 5 categories: Food, coffee, nightlife, shops, and arts/entertainment. This seems to be the focal point of the upgrade because it will allow users to use Foursquare outside of the initial checkin.
- Making checkins pay off: Foursquare has partnered with American Express to make it easier to be rewarded for checking in to certain places. Basically, you register your AmEx card and then get access to automatic savings specials when the card is swiped at supported locations. The caveat here is that this is definitely experimental and will only run from this Friday to Tuesday the 15th.
- Feeling special: Lastly, Foursquare has retooled their merchant specials by segmenting and categorizing them in an effort to make it easier for merchants to get involved with the specials features. The different types of specials are:
- Flash Specials - the first person or group of people to checkin after a certain time get a discount or reward.
- Friends Specials - Checking in with a smaller group Foursquare friends gets you the deal
- Swarm Specials - Large group checkins get special discounts and rewards.
- Newbie Specials - The first time you check in at a certain venue gets you a discount.
- Mayor Specials - The classic Foursquare special where being the mayor of a place gets you a discount.
Overall, these seem like strong improvements, although Foursquare is still combating Facebook Places and generally low adoption rates for location-based services as a whole. However, I do like that Foursquare is looking beyond the checkin to get more merchants involved and attempt to establish Foursquare as more than just the service you use to check in to places to get badges.