Feature
Location-based services are a contentious affair. On one hand, location-services give an edge to marketing, advertising, mapping and navigation services. However, there's also the issue with security and privacy, as users of mobile platforms are finding out, with iOS, Android and Windows Phone having tracked their users' locations at one point.
It's All About Location
Even with location-based services being a double-edged sword, it doesn't stop 28% of American mobile phone owners -- or 23% of the adult population -- from using their mobile phones to gain access to local deals and to get driving and navigational directions, according to the Pew study. Meanwhile, a bigger percentage of smartphone owners -- at 55% -- use location-based services, which is natural, as more advanced phones offer better geolocation features.
While geosocial services are popular, Pew's data shows that only a minority use services such as Foursquare or Gowalla to check in to their current locations. 5% of all mobile phone owners share their locations with their friends and contacts, which translates to about 4% of smartphone users.
Of the respondents, 14% say they have enabled automatic location tagging for their photos and status updates on social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook. These likewise use the smartphone's or mobile device's ability to tag content with the user's present location, whether retrieved from GPS satellites or triangulated from wireless networks.
Learning Opportunities
Webinar
Jun
6
The Future of Social Media: Emerging Trends and How to Stay Ahead of the Curve
The impact of emerging technologies like AI on social media
Webinar
Jun
7
The Building Blocks of Personalization
This webinar will explore how personalization can create powerful ecommerce shopping experience.
Webinar
Jun
8
Attracting—and Keeping—Your High-Net-Worth Investors
Join PwC to dissect their recent survey findings on a specific customer subset — high-net-worth investors.
Webinar
Jun
13
The Future of Contact Centers with AI at the Helm
Learn how to balance human intuition and interaction with the potential uses of AI to create delightful and lasting CX
Webinar
Jun
20
3 Steps to Unlock Your Customer Data and Drive Revenue
Discover how Twilio Segment’s #1 Customer Data Platform helps implement data-driven strategies.
Webinar
On demand
AI for Marketers: Optimize Personalization Across the Funnel
Understand the benefits of utilizing AI across your entire marketing stack
Asking for Directions? Check Your Smartphone
Pew's study found that the use of location-based services isn't much different between men and women. So while men are less likely to stop and ask for directions, both men and women are likely to use their smartphones to navigate and retrieve location-based information on establishments and deals, at 57% and 54%, respectively.
As for age, smartphone users are less likely to use their devices for directions and location-based business information, but the difference isn't too drastic. 18- to 49-year-olds are 58 to 60% likely to use their Android, iPhone or other mobile device for directions. 45% of users over 50 years of age do the same.
It's in the geosocial services that makes for a big disparity when it comes to age. The older the user, the less likely they use Foursquare, Gowalla or other similar services to share their locations. The under-30 set only uses these services 18% of the time. 12% of 30-49ers check in, and only 2% of smartphone users 50 and above share their current location with friends.
Do you use location-based services with your smartphone, tablet or other mobile device? To what extent? Do you check out local deals, navigate through online maps, or even check in with your current location?
