When Foursquare first came out, it seemed like just another silly social app for iPhone geeks, but now that it has had some time to grow, it’s becoming a must have for just about any business.

Major players like Zagat have signed on and will be doing more than just providing badges (the way users boast to each other on Foursquare). The foodie staple will be interviewing the mayors (biggest visitors to a venue) of Zagat-rated restaurants and will also suggest local Zagat restaurants to users.

Foursquare has also penned deals with Bravo that correspond with network shows; with the new star vehicle “Valentine’s Day;” with HBO’s “How to Make it in America” — even Harvard University.

If you aren’t already on Foursquare, you should be. No matter what kind of company you have, the old adage of marketing is “meet your customers where they live.” And your customers are on Foursquare.

A lot of companies will get on Facebook and Twitter and say they have a diverse social media portfolio, but these secondary social sites are key to getting to as many people as possible. So instead of playing on Facebook for far too long and calling it work tomorrow, get on Foursquare, Mobile Spinach, Whrrl, Loopt, GraffitiGeo, Hotlist, Yelp, Qype, Brightkite, not to mention Google Maps.

EQUTE — With SES in Chicago in full swing, there are a lot of great SEO ideas floating around and coming out to the tip-hungry public. But it was a state of mind rather than a tip that was one of the most interesting things to come out of SES so far — how to look at social media.

WebProNews has a good write-up about small business social media use, but the thing that stuck out the most was what Jennifer Evans Laycock, Search Engine Guide’s editor-in-chief, said.

[Laycock] prefers to think of it as a dating experience - “social media dating for small business marketers,” if you will — and went on to explain why.

Laycock believes there are seven common rules. First, people must listen. They must learn to be romantic (using what already exists for their own benefit), and not expect sex on the first date (think patience and persistence). It’s also important to be yourself (look at how Blendtec embraced its identity), to make yourself available, to seek out the right match, and to value long-term relationships.

This is the heart of social media marketing — it’s not a sure way to conversions, but joining the conversation where your readers or buyers live is the first step to meeting them and their friends or followers.

It’s hard to track social media, it reaches people at their most comfortable, where they are intrinsically not seeking advertisements. So build trust, spring for a dinner and a movie — even a peck on the cheek (a retweet or unsolicited shout out) can mean a lot online.

EQUTE — There are so, so many different software packages designed to help keep tabs of social media, and many are quite pricey.

Even if the general public could sign on, CoTweet runs $1,500 a month — just for Twitter — and other services charge monthly fees and huge start up fees just to sign on. So how can one keep tabs on their brand, their site, their product or their business leaders within the social media landscape?

Well one option is Yahoo!

Yahoo! you say?

Yes.

I had never personally used much before, but the Yahoo! Pipes are pretty interesting and are something I will surely use in the future. Just type in your business, brand, CEO etc and see what people are saying across all of social media. Since you can drop in several keywords and really get an eye on what people are saying. And instead of going to all the hundreds of sites and searching internally the “social media fire hose” checks them all and gives you a handy list and map.

Play around with it, there are scores of other interesting Yahoo! Pipes for just about anything.

EQUTE — Tracking in the Twitterverse is a little bit of a chore for most people. But a new Twitter analytics service is drawing some really, really big names, suggesting that internal analytics work is far off.

CoTweet promises many things:

The program includes:

Reach analytics — visibility into the true reach of Twitter messages and click thru rates on embedded links

Engagement analytics — reports on inbound and outbound message types (DM, @replies, @mentions), response rates and times, most active users

Influence analytics — measures the social media influence of brands and users, including those most influential in specific industries and topics; provided through partnership with Klout.

Extended customer conversation history — a lifetime archive of customer interactions

Priority updates — faster access to Twitter updates

Dedicated account management — a single point of contact providing account analysis and priority product support and training

The $1,500 a month service is only open to “select group of innovative companies,” so Twitter tracking for the masses will continue to be a hassle, but CoTweet is a good step toward making sense and making money off Twitter with real demonstrable results.

EQUTE — Netlog, sometimes known as the “European MySpace” got a fancy, Web 2.0 makeover as it looks to draw more users and prepare for the eminent rollout in the United States.

Techcrunch has a good write-up of the new Netlog changes, mostly the changes are designed to streamline the social network and add more interactivity through new games.

Techcrunch said the new changes aim to make it a more visually stimulating experience for its demographic.

Netlog currently sees about 250 million visits from 56 million unique visitors on a monthly basis and is handling half a million new sign-ups every week. Its main target has historically been young people (65% of its user base is between 14 and 24 years old) and with the redesign the company is clearly catering to that particular demographic, making the homepage much more visual and far less cluttered.

Along with those superficial changes, the new design — expected before 2010 begins — also makes it easier for advertisers to tap into their user base.

The redesigned profile page that offers personalized and custom themes, including branded advertisements.
Any advertisers looking to make some headway into the gamer demographic should keep an eye on Netlog and how the new changes are received.

The ad network Chitka did some research and found that more than anything, Twitter users want news.

A total of 28 percent of links leaving Twitter went to news stories.

So what can advertisers learn from this? Don’t just send out deals or coupons, make some announcements, tell your Twitter followers about something new and interesting you’re doing. They might repay the favor with a re-tweet and thus you’ve gone viral — at least a little bit — on Twitter.

EQUTE — A new survey shows that 54 percent of employers completely prohibit the use of social networking sites completely.

CIOs were asked in the survey: Which of the following most closely describes your company’s policy on visiting social networking sites, such as Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter, while at work?” Here is how they responded:

“Using social networking sites may divert employees’ attention away from more pressing priorities, so it’s understandable that some companies limit access,” said Dave Willmer, executive director of Robert Half Technology. “For some professions, however, these sites can be leveraged as effective business tools, which may be why about one in five companies allows their use for work-related purposes.”

So what does this mean for marketers? If you’re targeting a big company with your Facebook ads, make sure employees can see them. Perhaps turn them off until after the work day ends to get the most efficient use of your money.

An now some information on the study from Robert Half Technology:

The national survey was developed by Robert Half Technology, a leading provider of IT professionals on a project and full-time basis, and conducted by an independent research firm. The survey is based on more than 1,400 telephone interviews with CIOs from a random sample of U.S. companies with 100 or more employees. In order for the survey to be statistically representative, the sample was stratified by geographic region, industry and number of employees. The results were then weighted to reflect the proper proportions of the number of employees within each region. The margin of error for this study is +/- 2.6 percent at the 95 percent level of confidence.

EQUTE — Advertisers and marketers often get caught up in the newest, fastest most hyped internet trend. But the most current survey from the Online Publishers Association shows that users still spend a majority of their time looking at content.

The percentage of time spent reading articles and watching videos actually grew, even amid the explosion of social media and the increased adoption of internet communication tools such as instant messenger.

“In the six years that the IAI has reported on how consumers are spending their time online, we have seen some significant shifts, most notably the emergence of Community,” said Pam Horan, president of the OPA. “While Community has grown, data from the IAI proves that Content is still king; these sites continue to be a place where consumers spend the majority of their online time and provide an environment for brand marketers to reach and engage with consumers.”

Based on the six-year analysis of usage, internet uses spent 42 percent of their time at content-driven sites in 2009. OPA’s Internet Activity Index also tallied time spent at e-commerce sites, time spent using online communications, at online community sites and time spent searching the internet.

Horan said communications dropped so precipitously because services like Instant Messenger are slowly giving way to sites like Twitter, MySpace, etc. since people can do basically the same thing in real time or at their own leisure.

“In 2008, we introduced the Community category based on the emergence and popularity of sites like Facebook, MySpace and LinkedIn,” continued Horan. “These new sites have had significant impact on the Communications category, which saw a 41 percent decline, due to the fact consumers are using Community sites where they can conduct these same activities more efficiently.”

The most interesting thing I found from the numbers was the minute amount of time people actually spend searching the internet. The average user spends so little time searching that marketers need to be at the top of their game (and the rankings). The survey gives solid evidence that internet searchers are quite fickle, making it even more important to give them your results.

The biggest thing that anyone in business on the internet should take from these numbers, however, is simple: focus on content. Users want to read the latest news, the most interesting articles and the most informative blogs. Hiring a social media guru or spending hours on Facebook can be instrumental, but you should never neglect your content for the newest internet gizmo.

EQUTE — Well it may sound like a sad story about an unpopular rich kid, businesses are actually buying friends on Facebook.

Australian company uSocial is selling several different packages for Facebook. You can pick up 1,000 buddies for a little under $200 and up to 10,000 for about 1,170. There is some skepticism about their tactics — and Facebook isn’t happy.

“All we do is send them a welcome message or friend request from the client. If they decide to go ahead and add that person as a friend or a fan then they will; if not, then they won’t,” Leon Hill, uSocial CEO said.

While his tactics might be questionable, Hill is right about Facebook.

“Facebook is an extremely effective marketing tool,” said Hill. “The simple fact is that with a large following on Facebook, you have an instant and targeted group of people you can contact and promote whatever it is you want to promote.”

And he says he’s right there to save your workday from Facebook.

“The only problem is that it can be extremely difficult to achieve such a following, which is where we come in,” said Hill.

It’s an interesting idea, and it might work at some level, but the key to Facebook (and any social network) marketing is building repair with customers. Those friends you buy for a couple hundred dollars don’t care what they are clicking on, and in a few days they will notice you in their friend feed and say farewell.

It’s a long road, but you’re probably spending a good chunk of the day on Facebook anyway, may as well spend it helping your company build its brand.