Foursquare taps into omnichannel

When Foursquare partnered with GrubHub-Seamless this week, it was more than just a boon for lazy burrito lovers. It provided a useful illustration of what omnichannel is intended to be today, and it’s part of the lead story in this week’s Searchlight.

Back in the day (a few years ago), if you were alone in a strange city and wanted to know where people in your social network got good grub, Foursquare could help point you in the right direction. But with its new partnership, the customer experience is taking on a new dimension. You can reach your end goal — eating a burrito — without ever “leaving” your smartphone; when you find what you want based on others’ recommendations and your own location, you can have that burrito delivered straight to your door (that’s where GrubHub-Seamless comes in). It’s social, information rich, integrated and delivers (near) instant consumer gratification.

It fits in well with the “expanded” definition of omnichannel, which calls for satisfying all customers these days — not just the customers of a particular brand or restaurant. Seamlessly skip over to SearchCIO to get the full story as well as news of Google’s big AI acquisition, why the NSA loves Angry Birds and more.