March 9, 2012
Foursquare Members Check-In for Savings at Walgreens
Foursquare members looking for a good deal can seek it at Walgreens now whenever they check-in at one of the chain’s stores using their Android, Blackberry or iPhone. By simply checking-in, foursquare members will receive a scanable coupon that can be redeemed in the store without the need for a reply or any other steps on their part.
Walgreens claims it is the first retailer in the country to offer the program. The first offer valid through March 10 is for half-off on AriZona Iced Tea cans.
"We’re using mobile technology and social media to better engage Walgreens customers, to give them convenient channels to interact with us and to deliver products, services and savings they truly value," said Sona Chawla, Walgreens president of E-commerce, in a press release. "With this program, it’s just check in and the coupon is displayed instantly."
Part of what makes the Walgreens/foursquare program unique is the drugstore chain’s use of optical scanners. As an Internet Retailer article points out, bar codes on smartphones can not be read by conventional laser scanners and very few retailers have optical scanners in stores. Walgreens installed the scanners in all of its stores in 2011.
BrainTrust
Recent Discussions
Discussion Questions
Discussion Questions: What is your assessment of the Walgreens/foursquare mobile couponing program? Do you expect to see many other retailers pursuing similar programs?
Poll
Unlike the Amex program, which is also a BrainTrust topic today, this is much ado about nothing. Why would someone take the time to check into a Walgreens to save 50 cents on a can of ice tea? It may signal in interesting use of technology, but the offer is not compelling.
I think the future of social media for marketing purposes will be more than point-of-purchase coupons for random products. The secret is to employ the platforms available, including Foursquare and others, to truly engage versus simply sell promotion price merchandise.
I have never understood how offers that have the same old ultimate payoff — “cents off on something’ — can be construed as “increasing engagement” when the only thing different between that offer and 50 cents off at the shelf is that I have to cross some barrier to get it.
Typically these offers are designed to either a) LIMIT participation — not increase it, or b) to harvest information from the consumer somehow, or c) to get someone else other than the retailer to fund the offer.
Price offers driven by technology do not create engagement any more than making consumers clip coupons did.
Anything is better than the foot long coupons you get out of the register at CVS.
I think this is a nice touch. The fact that Walgreens is using Foursquare is great for Foursquare, but the notion of paperless coupons is clearly the wave of the future.
Walgreens’ use of Foursquare for in-store coupons is only going to be successful, i.e., profitable, if it generates incremental sales. The challenge of delivering coupons in-store is that it is often dilutive. In other words, these coupons discount items that customers would otherwise buy at full price.
One of the inherent challenges of social platforms like Foursquare and Facebook is that they are essentially mass marketing channels. It’s hard for most retailers to tie purchase behavior to social messaging. That leads to dilution and erodes profitability and ROI.
The use of optical scanners holds a lot of promise for a variety of mobile apps. When combined with a loyalty program and a suggestive selling application, it gives Walgreens or another retailer a way to provide meaningful discounts and rewards on an instant basis for a broad array of items based on the customer’s purchase patterns.
The news here is foursquare’s, not Walgreens’. It’s a program that’s not very scalable since check-in services other than foursquare have low penetration and this is platform specific.
But for foursquare, it’s further proof of concept. Walgreens’ participation will stand as another reference case, even for retailers that lack optical scanners. This will help foursquare’s other emergent offer programs, which include check-in specials (standard program), loyalty specials (digital punch cards), friends specials (social sharing) and flash specials (time sensitive). Foursquare needs national retailers to adopt its offer program to build a viable business model.
It’s no small commitment for Walgreens, which needs to test the scanners and train associates. It could be argued that this initiative competes with Walgreens’ own mobile app. With increasing trials of social media, foursquare is in good company with Facebook and Twitter and national brand participants.
The effectiveness of these campaigns will be determined by the substance of the “coupon.” If the coupon generated is for particular products, it will be hit and miss. If it is for dollars-off the purchase, it will be more effective.
CVS Extra Care has helped CVS establish significant advantage over Walgreens, but their use of data to deliver specific offers needs lots of improvement. As a member, I rarely get a product offer that is relevant. Receiving $12 in ExtraCare bucks is quite another matter.
Never cared much for those check-in apps. Time flies while you’re having no fun tapping on your screen telling strangers where you are. What’s in it for me?
Walgreen and Foursquare would have us believe that they will provide a valuable offer to make this trouble worthwhile. What if I don’t like tea? In the example given here, I’d have given away a slice of my precious personal data in exchange for — nothing of value.
Marketers: If you want to capture my behavior so badly, you can pay for access — up front, in currency that has real value to me. Time-consuming silly apps won’t win me over, neither will improbable lottery prizes, or irrelevant coupon incentives. I don’t have to make this easy for you either. Your job is to make it easy for me.
Beyond the immediate application and cents-off approach, Walgreens made a major leap forward through its installation of optical scanners. This demonstrates that they are serious about building store-level infrastructure to support mobile and social. Others may dabble, Walgreens is making a commitment. I also love the immediacy and customer-friendliness of the foursquare program. It turns customer check-ins into a “why not?” proposition rather than expecting shoppers to jump through hoops in order to save a few cents. Finally, Walgreens is helping the industry by serving as a beta for the foursquare tie-in rather than being precious about its own applications. Nice move all around!
Wait! Wait! Temporarily silence the Greek Chorus of Naysayers! I think some of the brethren and sisteren may be looking at this a tad … er … backwards.
Offering a cents-off coupon for “checking in” is … well … dumb, unless of course the person would be checking in anyway (ala many Foursquarers’ behavior). The difference is a subtle one. Many of us seem to be looking at this as a “reward” offer — again sort of dumb on its face, when, in reality, it has some promise as a “recognition” — as in we know who you are and how you roll — tactic.
While I’m deeply concerned about Max and Ben and thrill to know they have “checked in” at Phil’s Psychedelic Pizza, I suspect most “check-ins” are really little more than shallow and narcissistic pleas for recognition across the cold, binary space of the Digital Divide. You let the world know where you are and the world … well, the world probably doesn’t care all that much. But, now when you check in at Walgreens at least somebody knows you’re alive and they demonstrate that in the oldest, most deeply sacred tradition of the retail tribe — they try to bribe you to buy something you were (a) going to buy anyway or (b) couldn’t care less about.
Ben! Max! Embrace the humanity of it all. Think of all those lonely Foursquarers aimlessly ambling through aisles of alienation. Finally, their deepest needs to be “seen” have been answered — and at a Walgreens of all places.
Of ye jaded cynics! Have you no social soul?
I look at this sort of like impulse purchases. A person is not going to go to Walgreens because of this coupon, but if they are going anyway, to pick up Rx or other, they know they can check in and maybe get a deal on something. Why is this good for Walgreens? Well, we humans, when we see that our friends/family are shopping at Walgreens and we use CVS … hmmm, we might wonder if we should check it out. The power of persuasion.
Wouldn’t it be cool if Walgreens and Foursquare could also tell the shopper where to find the promoted product(s) in that particular store?
It would be an integration of planogram and store map data with the promotion that could help move shopper traffic past other parts of the store that have strategic value to Walgreens.
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Unlike the Amex program, which is also a BrainTrust topic today, this is much ado about nothing. Why would someone take the time to check into a Walgreens to save 50 cents on a can of ice tea? It may signal in interesting use of technology, but the offer is not compelling.
I think the future of social media for marketing purposes will be more than point-of-purchase coupons for random products. The secret is to employ the platforms available, including Foursquare and others, to truly engage versus simply sell promotion price merchandise.
I have never understood how offers that have the same old ultimate payoff — “cents off on something’ — can be construed as “increasing engagement” when the only thing different between that offer and 50 cents off at the shelf is that I have to cross some barrier to get it.
Typically these offers are designed to either a) LIMIT participation — not increase it, or b) to harvest information from the consumer somehow, or c) to get someone else other than the retailer to fund the offer.
Price offers driven by technology do not create engagement any more than making consumers clip coupons did.
Anything is better than the foot long coupons you get out of the register at CVS.
I think this is a nice touch. The fact that Walgreens is using Foursquare is great for Foursquare, but the notion of paperless coupons is clearly the wave of the future.
Walgreens’ use of Foursquare for in-store coupons is only going to be successful, i.e., profitable, if it generates incremental sales. The challenge of delivering coupons in-store is that it is often dilutive. In other words, these coupons discount items that customers would otherwise buy at full price.
One of the inherent challenges of social platforms like Foursquare and Facebook is that they are essentially mass marketing channels. It’s hard for most retailers to tie purchase behavior to social messaging. That leads to dilution and erodes profitability and ROI.
The use of optical scanners holds a lot of promise for a variety of mobile apps. When combined with a loyalty program and a suggestive selling application, it gives Walgreens or another retailer a way to provide meaningful discounts and rewards on an instant basis for a broad array of items based on the customer’s purchase patterns.
The news here is foursquare’s, not Walgreens’. It’s a program that’s not very scalable since check-in services other than foursquare have low penetration and this is platform specific.
But for foursquare, it’s further proof of concept. Walgreens’ participation will stand as another reference case, even for retailers that lack optical scanners. This will help foursquare’s other emergent offer programs, which include check-in specials (standard program), loyalty specials (digital punch cards), friends specials (social sharing) and flash specials (time sensitive). Foursquare needs national retailers to adopt its offer program to build a viable business model.
It’s no small commitment for Walgreens, which needs to test the scanners and train associates. It could be argued that this initiative competes with Walgreens’ own mobile app. With increasing trials of social media, foursquare is in good company with Facebook and Twitter and national brand participants.
The effectiveness of these campaigns will be determined by the substance of the “coupon.” If the coupon generated is for particular products, it will be hit and miss. If it is for dollars-off the purchase, it will be more effective.
CVS Extra Care has helped CVS establish significant advantage over Walgreens, but their use of data to deliver specific offers needs lots of improvement. As a member, I rarely get a product offer that is relevant. Receiving $12 in ExtraCare bucks is quite another matter.
Never cared much for those check-in apps. Time flies while you’re having no fun tapping on your screen telling strangers where you are. What’s in it for me?
Walgreen and Foursquare would have us believe that they will provide a valuable offer to make this trouble worthwhile. What if I don’t like tea? In the example given here, I’d have given away a slice of my precious personal data in exchange for — nothing of value.
Marketers: If you want to capture my behavior so badly, you can pay for access — up front, in currency that has real value to me. Time-consuming silly apps won’t win me over, neither will improbable lottery prizes, or irrelevant coupon incentives. I don’t have to make this easy for you either. Your job is to make it easy for me.
Beyond the immediate application and cents-off approach, Walgreens made a major leap forward through its installation of optical scanners. This demonstrates that they are serious about building store-level infrastructure to support mobile and social. Others may dabble, Walgreens is making a commitment. I also love the immediacy and customer-friendliness of the foursquare program. It turns customer check-ins into a “why not?” proposition rather than expecting shoppers to jump through hoops in order to save a few cents. Finally, Walgreens is helping the industry by serving as a beta for the foursquare tie-in rather than being precious about its own applications. Nice move all around!
Wait! Wait! Temporarily silence the Greek Chorus of Naysayers! I think some of the brethren and sisteren may be looking at this a tad … er … backwards.
Offering a cents-off coupon for “checking in” is … well … dumb, unless of course the person would be checking in anyway (ala many Foursquarers’ behavior). The difference is a subtle one. Many of us seem to be looking at this as a “reward” offer — again sort of dumb on its face, when, in reality, it has some promise as a “recognition” — as in we know who you are and how you roll — tactic.
While I’m deeply concerned about Max and Ben and thrill to know they have “checked in” at Phil’s Psychedelic Pizza, I suspect most “check-ins” are really little more than shallow and narcissistic pleas for recognition across the cold, binary space of the Digital Divide. You let the world know where you are and the world … well, the world probably doesn’t care all that much. But, now when you check in at Walgreens at least somebody knows you’re alive and they demonstrate that in the oldest, most deeply sacred tradition of the retail tribe — they try to bribe you to buy something you were (a) going to buy anyway or (b) couldn’t care less about.
Ben! Max! Embrace the humanity of it all. Think of all those lonely Foursquarers aimlessly ambling through aisles of alienation. Finally, their deepest needs to be “seen” have been answered — and at a Walgreens of all places.
Of ye jaded cynics! Have you no social soul?
I look at this sort of like impulse purchases. A person is not going to go to Walgreens because of this coupon, but if they are going anyway, to pick up Rx or other, they know they can check in and maybe get a deal on something. Why is this good for Walgreens? Well, we humans, when we see that our friends/family are shopping at Walgreens and we use CVS … hmmm, we might wonder if we should check it out. The power of persuasion.
Wouldn’t it be cool if Walgreens and Foursquare could also tell the shopper where to find the promoted product(s) in that particular store?
It would be an integration of planogram and store map data with the promotion that could help move shopper traffic past other parts of the store that have strategic value to Walgreens.