Foursquare just made checking in at your favorite coffee joint even easier with new one-step check-in functionality. The question is, will anyone care?
For iPhone users, checking in is now a speedy, one-step process. Before this update, you’d have to tap on the venue you’re at in a list of nearby locations, and then tap on the check in button. Now, thanks to more precise location data, you just tap once, and you’re checked in. Tap the card of the place you’re at and you’ll notice a green status bar “glide across the top of the screen,” says Foursquare. You also have the option of pressing and holding the blue bar that says “Looks like you’re near [venue name],” which further eases the check in process.
If for some reason you’re a stickler for old fashioned check-ins, Foursquare reminds us that you can still do so the clunky, old way.
While this is all well and good, check-ins are a dying feature, one that Foursquare users have been neglecting in droves. Unable to keep up the charade as a location-based social network, Foursquare recently pivoted, saying that it is now in the business of helping users discover new venues, with a social spin to it. Despite Foursquare’s business makeover, however, check-ins remain important. After all, they were once the whole point of Foursquare, at least when founder Dennis Crowley first created it. Plus, check-ins provide Foursquare with valuable user data – so doing away with them altogether just isn’t an option.
Because of this, Foursquare isn’t shy about encouraging (some might say begging) users to check in. “Remember: each time you check in, you’re teaching us about the restaurants, bars, and shops you like, so we can give you even smarter recommendations in Explore,” the company wrote in a recent blog post. “And now that it takes just a split-second, it’s even easier to check in everywhere you go.”
Check-ins don’t just help Fousquare – they help users, too. Foursquare uses various signals closely tied to the data derived from check-ins, like how many times you’ve visited a venue, which is used to offer you and even your friends better venue recommendations. So if you’re a Foursquare addict, and are gung-ho about its future, a word of advice: Check-ins will only improve Foursquare’s ecosystem. So keep using them, if you want the app to stick around.
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