Foursquare last week announced a new feature that allows businesses to target repeat customers with news, photos and deals.

Local Updates

Foursquare’s ‘Local Updates’ lets merchants send text, photos and specials to customers who have either checked into a business several times or liked it on Foursquare. The updates will be shown to customers when they're in the city where that business is located.

Merchant updates will also appear in search results when consumers search for a place in the Foursquare mobile app or on the web. Merchants can manage updates from the merchant dashboard, which has been redesigned to let business owners and marketers view data on individual business locations or a group of locations.

“When loyal customers are in your store, specials are great, because they can motivate your behavior,” Foursquare product manager Noah Weiss told Fast Company. “But Local Updates opens up a communications channel with them when they’re not in your store. Merchants on Foursquare have never had the ability to do that before.”

Competition

Although both Living Social and Groupon offer ways to blast deals to mobile users nearby, Foursquare’s latest feature allows merchants to create non-deal updates, like “Freshly baked bread out of the oven!”

Merchants who had previously just been able to claim venues and set up specials on Foursquare can now, via Local Updates, use location and social intelligence to target their most ideal customers.

H&M, Outback Steakhouse and the New York Public Library are among the first businesses to start sharing Local Updates.

This video outlines Foursquare's Local Updates feature.