Marketing in Geospatial: What's New

I saw two interesting marketing moves from geospatial companies this week. Each one is "off the beaten path" just enough to be considered clever.

CartoDB ran an audio ad in the Data Stories podcast. One of the hosts read the text and pointed listeners to the company's gallery page. "Learn how CartoDB is shaping the world of location intelligence at cartodb.com/gallery." The topic of the podcast, ironically, is turning data, gravitational waves, into audio, rather than anything visual. I didn't listen to the podcast since I'd heard about the concept some time ago on NPR.

Mapbox is running a series of "ask me a question" posts on Reddit/GIS. These are not "Ask me anythings (AMAs) exactly, but an offer by Blake Thompson, a software engineer at Mapbox, to answer questions about specific GIS topics. First up were: algorithms and Web map APIs. As you can see, there was a good amount of interaction/engagement.

LinkedIn for Geospatial Professionals: Worth the Energy?

I think of LinkedIn as the place you go when looking for a job, or in my case, for potential consulting clients or partners. My experience has been disappointing.

I keep hearing from those in communications and marketing that LinkedIn can be very valuable for getting the word out about an individual's or company's products or services. I believe these people, but I do think some industries/communities "do better" on some social platforms than others. And, I for one haven't found much compelling about LinkedIn for the geospatial practitioner.

The State of Location-based Social Media in 2015

The Plague app shares posts based on proximity.

Remember when location-based services, LBSs, were going to be the next big thing? When nearly all the GIS companies focused acquisitions, development and hiring to be ready? When new publications came online to cover it? As a datapoint consider that Directions Magazine acquired what became LBS360 in 2006, and shut it down a few years later.

Things change. Today GIS and general  technical publication rarely mention LBS. LBS still exists; it's just the important bit, location, is embedded within other apps and services, notably, social media ones. What is going on in location-based social media as 2015 opens its curtains?

A Geographer Looks at EdTech - Part 2 - Social Media

--- This post is the second in a ten part series examining top 2011 trends in education technology in the context of GIS and geography education. ---

The second theme Audrey Watters identified in her top ten list of ed tech for 2011 is social media. She discusses the rise of Edmodo, a growing education-only social media tool and the legal challenges teachers and students face when using worldwide social networks such as Facebook.

While there are still legal issues to be ironed out with "non ed-specific" social media, my gut feeling is that whenever possible, students should use "the real thing." That is, they should use Facebook, Twitter, Blogger, etc. - the same tools they'll use in the real world. I know that can require more energy for IT departments, legal departments and instructors, but I think its worth it in the long term.

It's worth noting that a new geospatially focused social network is launching in January. It's called GISnation and will have all sorts of membership types including one for students. I confess to having mixed feelings about this venture. While it'd be lovely to have a discipline-specific social network, many attempts at something along these lines have failed in recent years. A whole raft of sites with forums and blog consolidation have failed (see for example The GIS Forum, which shut down about Feb 2011 and has since lost its domain registration). A geospatial Reddit is still alive but pretty quiet. GIS-StackExchange is doing better but seems to have a programmer focus, rather than a more general scope. I expect the most valuable social networks for students and users of GIS will be self-forming on platforms like Twitter and Google+, which it's rumored, may have a dedicated K-12 segment in time.

On the other hand, I do expect more and more cloud based mapping sites such as ArcGIS Online and to have their own in-built social tools. Those could be most valuable for students, as long as they are guided in responsible use by educators.