Foursquare partners with TripAdvisor, wants to "make noise" in travel sector

TripAdvisor is the latest travel brand to partner with Foursquare, the company that began as a social check-in app for consumers but in recent years has evolved to focus on providing location intelligence data to businesses.

TripAdvisor is embedding Foursquare’s Pilgrim SDK (software development kit) into its mobile app to improve the location-based, real-time information and recommendations it can provide to travelers.

In an email, TripAdvisor says, "We think their [Foursquare’s] offering will complement our existing technology and help us give travelers a great experience when using TripAdvisor to plan and book the perfect trip."

Foursquare’s data comes from a variety of sources including more than 13 billion check-ins since the app launched in 2009 and 50 million current active users of its Foursquare City Guide and Foursquare Swarm apps. The platform sees location data from over 375 million devices every year - more than 250 million of which are in the United States – through its apps and data from partners. The platform also has more than 105 million venues mapped around the world.

Along with basic information about locations and hours, the database includes user-provided content such as photos, menu information and tips.

Foursquare vice president of enterprise Sam Weber says the Pilgrim SDK combines that information with the platform’s “stop-detection technology,” which uses GPS and Wi-Fi signals to “quickly and very accurately detect where you are and snap you to a specific place,” enabling the system to send relevant, location-based information.

“They [TripAdvisor] are very keen on making sure when they share information about a venue or a location with their users that it is the most fresh and up-to-date and personal as it can be,” Weber says.

“What we allowed them to do was get there faster because we have core technology that is somewhat off the shelf and is embeddable, and they could reach their target objectives of getting these features into their hands in a much more rapid fashion.”

Foursquare says the partnership is part of TripAdvisor’s “socially assistive app experience,” an update the brand announced in September.

Deeper in travel

In September, Hilton announced it was adding location-based recommendations to its Hilton Honors mobile app, powered by another Foursquare enterprise service: its Places API.

“While with Hilton we are more core and powering many of the features in their Explore application, with TripAdvisor we are more of an enhancement,” Weber says.

Weber says Foursquare realized in 2014 that it was “sitting on top of a very important and powerful data set” that had value for consumer brands. That began the development of its enterprise services, which is drawing notable interest from travel brands of late.

“We have pilots in play with a handful of the big hotel brands beyond Hilton, and they are all looking to do very similar things to what Hilton is doing. ... In and around the planning, dreaming and visiting concepts within the travel segment,” he says.

”And then we’ve had many conversations that are ongoing with some of the big online travel agencies - nothing actually signed yet but in play and high levels of interest in adding Foursquare to their mobile and digital strategies.”

The company says this momentum on the enterprise side is also validated by its announcement in September of a Series F funding round of $33 million, co-led by Simon Ventures and Naver Corp, with participation from Union Square Ventures, an existing investor.

To date, Foursquare has raised more than $240 million.

“We have been a semi-quiet company around our enterprise focus up until recently, and in 2019 I think the market in general will become much more aware of just how capable we are,” Weber says.

“We believe, as compared to other players in the market, the only one that comes close to Facebook and Google in the location awareness space is Foursquare. And we provide a really strong alternative to the tools they have in market and can augment what they are doing even if we are not competing.

"We are third in market, if not first, from a pure location technology perspective, and we’ll make a lot of noise about it next year.”