It's been an important week for location technology, with Foursquare announcing some big changes in their plans to monetise their service by generating revenue outside of it. One of our startups, HitMeUp, have been also making some excellent progress with their social location mobile app. HitMeUp is designed to help you discover what's hot near you, right now. It does this by allowing you to upload your photographs onto an evolving map. The photos will only appear on the map for a limited number of hours, unless they are voted up, which adds time, using the 'Hit' button. This uniquely allows users to see where is trending, and to get involved with events local to them.
Recently, they conducted a treasure hunt where local businesses hid prizes around London in little HitMeUp boxes, and provided their locations using the app. Then the businesses tweeted about the hunt; overall there were over 30 prizes up for grabs, and scattered all over central London. When people found their prizes, they added pictures of themselves with their prize on HitMeUp. Also, in the box was a note that said "if you thought this was a nice idea, take your prize, go and buy another prize to put back in the box, re-hide the box, and give the new location using HitMeUp". Wonderfully, some members of the public did that.
Here is some key data HitMeUp collected from their Treasure Hunt:
These results and the news mentioned earlier prove that location apps are becoming increasingly relevant in this ever-mobile and ever-social future.
