As location based check-in services such as Foursquare and Facebook Places attempts to make a bigger dent in the online market they may want to rethink how they target their adult demographic. That’s because adults in a recent study revealed that only 5% of older users take advantage of location based services and everything they offer.

Surveying 37,000 people the Forrester Group found that only 2% of adult users take advantage of location based services (LBS) at least once or more per week, while 1% of users claim to use the service once a month and 2% of users say they use the service but less than one time per month.

The heart of the issue appears to be that many adults don’t even realize that location based services exist, for example 70% of respondents said they didn’t even realize that location based check-in programs exist. That 70% statistics is however a vast improvement over the 84% of adult users who were unfamiliar with location based services in 2010.

Location based services also appear not to resonate with a subset of adults with 10% saying they have seen the programs used but have chosen not to use them and the remaining 14% say they have heard of the program but have never seen them actually used by anyone.  read more

Holiday travel is almost as much of a tradition in the United States as the holiday’s themselves. Wanting to examine holiday travel trends from last years travel Foursquare created an infographic that shows how people traveled from Halloween until just after Christmas 2010.

In the graphic planes, trains and automobiles (Steve Martin would be happy) were plotted out to show how people traveled and from which destinations they traveled.

To compile their data Foursquare examined the two airports each traveler checked into (departing and arriving airports) and they did the same for train stations. To determine automobile traffic they then used checkins on major highways and roads to show how heavily trafficked major interstates have become during the holiday travel season.

You’ll also notice that the team at Foursquare plotted out a timeline which shows the peaks that occur during Thanksgiving and Christmas and on a smaller level during New Years Eve.

One thing missing is the number of checkins for each activity which would have been nice to examine in order to better understand what modes of transportation are chosen by the most people during holiday travel.

Here’s the Foursquare travel infographic:

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In the previous version of Foursquare users would earn a badge and then move onto other check-in events to earn other types of rewards, leaving behind their “Swarm” and other badges, however the company is now offering a “Level Up” system which adds increasing levels each time an event is earned.

The new system current affects 24 category badges including “JetSetter,” “Great Outdoors,” and “Wino” among others

According to Foursquare Head of Product Alex Rainert:

“It’s rewarding exploration and awarding expertise,” and “It’s a platform to showcase tastemakers and get their content exposed.” read more

In case you’ve been living under a rock or spending every conceivable moment on Facebook and nowhere else on the web here’s a list of five stories from the past week that are worth taking a look at.

1. YouTube Sending User-Submitted Science Experiments Into Space

How cool would it be to have Stephen Hawking and a group of his peers choose your science experiment to launch into outerspace. YouTube is holding a contest through their YouTube Space Lab which allows users to submit 2-minute experiment ideas. Two winners will watch live as their experiments are carried out aboard the International Space Station. This is social media meets social experimentation at it’s finest. read more

iPhone and iPad users on Thursday were treated to the newest release of Foursquare and with that app release comes a brand new feature called Radar.

Radar works by allowing users to check-in at locations and then receive information about other hot spots they might want to try. For example Foursquare gives the example of following the list “2001 best dishes and drinks” at which point checking in at one of that lists locations will provide you with information about other spots in the area you might want to try.

The Radar system also provides users with ability to receive notifications when their friends are in the same area. read more

In case you missed them we have five stories from 9/5/11 through 9/9/11 that you should be sure to check out. Whether you’re a Facebook user with multiple admin pages, a Foursquare users trying to figure out why your friends haven’t adapted the technology or an Instagram fan we have something this week that you’ll find engaging. Also be sure to check out our post about the Google acquisition of Zagat and Google’s big plans for the Google +1 button.

Facebook Security Flaw Let’s Users Hijack Pages From Original Owners 

Facebook pages are meant to provide users with a forum to share a specific interest or set of interests, this week it was discovered that page creators could be booted from their own pages by administrators who they assigned to help moderate their public forums. Facebook FAQ say that type of activity isn’t allowed but it was discovered to be a possibility.

Smartphone Users Less Likely To Checkin Than Perform Other Tasks [Study]

Smartphone users love to play Angry Birds, even check their email, text message and make phone calls, what they don’t care much for is the ability to “check-in” at locations using location based services such as Foursquare and Gowalla. This article examines numbers provided by a recent Pew Research Survey and shows that less than 15% of users have taken to location based services and even fewer of those users are checkin-in each day.

Here Comes Instagram: Infographic

Instagram is quickly becoming a juggernaut in the social sharing photo platform world. While Flickr took 2 years to reach 100 million photos, Instagram reached that same level in just 8 months while attracting 7 million users in just nine months. This infographic shows the incredible speed at which Infogram has become a big player in the photo sharing world. read more

Geo-location based services such as Foursquare and Gowalla may be growing their active user bases but they aren’t exactly the most popular programs among Smartphone users.

According to a recent study by the Pew Research Center, Foursquare and other location based applications are the least popular apps among smartphone users.

The survey asked 2,277 adults about their preferences when using their phones and more than half said they access social networks, send photos and view email, while only 12% of smartphone owners say checkin services are a regular part of their daily routine.

The study also found that checkin users are even less likely to share their location to Facebook and Twitter with just 9% of internet users and 14% of  experience social media users posting their locations to social networks.

Here’s a look at how Smartphone users are utilizing their devices programs: read more

Foursquare has announced a new feature which allows users to check into major events, a task users typically fulfill by checking in at various locations and then typing a message so friends know why they are at those venues.

On their official Foursquare blog post they wrote:

“It’s one of the most common checkins on Foursquare: you head off to a movie theater, check in, and type in ‘Harry Potter’ to tell people what you’re seeing. Or check in to a stadium and shout ‘Patriots game’ or ‘Lady Gaga concert.”

Company officials went on to add: read more

President Obama has joined the world of location based services, signing onto Foursquare this week.

After signing up for the popular check-in service the White House released the following statement:

“The White House is now on Foursquare, a location-based social networking website, which is the latest way for you to engage with the administration,” while adding, “There are over 10 million people already ‘checking in’ around the world, and now you’ll be able to discover ‘tips’ from the White House featuring the places President Obama has visited, what he did there, plus historical information and more.”

The President’s Foursquare account will be used to post his whereabouts as he tours the country for his economic bus tour, focusing on the Midwest at this time.

Along with the President’s location, various checkin locations for different presidential events are being created, while White House staffers have already posted their first tip on Monday, revealing that the President had delivered a speech in Cannon Falls, Minnesota where he talked about growing and strengthening the economy. read more

On Tuesday location based service Foursquare announced that they now have 500,000 free merchants using their system and today they have revealed that business pages are now a self-serve option that any business can utilize.

Business owners looking to utilize the system can sign up for a free business page using their Twitter account login, at which point they can choose to share check-ins and tips with their Facebook and Twitter accounts.

The system also allows business owners to setup multiple manager accounts to expand their reach across different regions and even divisions of a company.

Before the new system was put in place the Foursquare development team had hand-code almost 3,000 brand pages for businesses. read more