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By Maria Stadtmueller. In case you hadn’t noticed, location-based services really haven’t taken off, and users are mostly the same people as those young, active contributors to social networks. The chief barriers? A lack of clear benefit and privacy fears.

So what should marketers keen on geo-location do?

By Steve Mullins. What makes social brands social? Well, for one thing, they engage in active listening, searching the social web to listen to what people are saying – with the intention of acting on what is uncovered, according to the Social Brands 100 Report, from Headstream.

“This improves a brand’s understanding of, and empathy with, individuals, which in turn informs subsequent actions as is evident in the brand’s exhibited behaviours,” says the report.

By Simon Fuller. Facebook continues to grow, but the social networking giant has a few thorns in its side when it comes to teens. One is the number of parents signing up for accounts – which at best makes teens lose a bit of street cred, and at worst drives them from the site alrogether.

eMarketer’s Demographic Profile: Teens report suggests that some 58% of 13-to-14 year-olds asked were either irritated or felt nervous that their parents had appeared on their social network

Sony and WWF have decided to develop the GreenBook concept, derived from their Open Planet Ideas environmental crowdsourcing project. The campaign aimed at getting members of the public to try and imagine how Sony tech could be repurposed to address green problems.

GreenBook is a cross-platform app using geo-location and social gaming techniques to create a new method of informal, flash mob volunteering, where people locate each other and work together on tasks.

Marketers are set to spend $1.8 billion in 2015 on location-based advertising with providers such as Loopt, Gowalla and Foursquare, according to a new study from ABI Research.
But advertisers are still finding their feet in the segment. “It’s still early days and there’s no single right approach to location-based advertising,” says AIB practice director Neil [...]

Marketing promo outfit PlacePop has lit its app on the recently launched Facebook Places platform. The application helps businesses provide local recommendations, loyalty programs and rewards.
PlacePop says Facebook Places, which features a location-based activity feed, has the potential to be one of the most significant value-creating events from Facebook since its opened the developer API [...]

Marketers are set to spend $1.8 billion in 2015 on location-based advertising with providers such as Loopt, Gowalla and Foursquare, according to a new study from ABI Research.
But advertisers are still finding their feet in the segment. “It’s still early days and there’s no single right approach to location-based advertising,” says AIB practice director Neil [...]

Google is rolling out its sponsored map icons in the US after trialling the service in Australia and New Zealand. The beta launch will feature four brands – Bank of America, HSBC, Public Storage and Target – who want to show off their physical locations on those very handy Google Maps.
“By helping users identify popular [...]