Maponics Blog

Shopping Boundaries Can Help Address “Showrooming”

Gloria Dufield, Marketing Specialist — Tue, 22 May 2012 13:52:26 +0000

Last week in both trade and main stream media, there were a flurry of articles on how brick-and-mortar retailers were turning to geofencing to combat “showrooming”. This term has appeared in recent years to describe customers who visit a retailer to find an item and then use their smartphones to search for the best price from an online retailer. This behavior has forced brick-and-mortars to find alternative options like geofences to compete with online retailers .

With Maponics Shopping Boundaries ^TM, brick-and-mortar retailers can find an effective and easy way to address “showrooming”. Our latest release of shopping boundaries has nationwide coverage in the U.S. and in and around the largest cities in Canada. These boundaries are not only key to location based advertising for retailers (See Shopping Boundaries Help Target Serial Shoppers), but also have relevancy for social applications, tourism, area display and more. Shopping Boundaries are released on a quarterly basis.

A few highlights from the latest release:

Expanding coverage in the largest cities in Canada
Growth in U.S. coverage to include medium to small cities
Addition of more local shopping locations in major cities like New York, Los Angles and Chicago

Maponics Shopping Boundaries includes the boundary outlining shopping areas and adjacent parking, along with the name, address and type of shopping area. We have over 3,300 shopping locations in North America representing all types of shopping including districts, malls, centers and outlets.

Product coverage ranges from the most prestigious shopping areas for tourism, socializing and shopping like Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills and Madison Avenue in New York City to the most accessible and practical for errands, quick purchases and necessities such as Les Galeries Gatineau in Québec .

: Rodeo Drive – The Golden Triangle

: Les Galeries Gatineau and Les Promenades

Maponics CEO Speaking on Geo-data Mining at Location Intelligence Conference

Gloria Dufield, Marketing Specialist — Wed, 16 May 2012 18:48:35 +0000

Maponics CEO and Founder, Darrin Clement, will be speaking at the Directions Magazine Location Intelligence Conference next Tuesday, May 22^nd in Washington, D.C. He will be joined on the “Cloud Computing and Data as a Service” panel by Lindsay McGreevy of Skygone, Duncan Guthrie from Socium Ltd and TomTom’s George de Boer. Darrin’s panel presentation, “Pros and Cons of Mining the Web for Geo-data”, will include several keys to successfully mining the Web for geographic data based on real world, commercial needs.

Don’t miss this great conference and Darrin’s presentation, register today!

Cloud Computing and Data as a Service panel
Date: Tuesday, May 22, 2012
Time: 2:05-3:15 pm
Location: Horizon Room “A”,Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center

Want to meet with Darrin or a member of our Sales Team at this Conference? Email marketing@maponics.com to schedule a meeting.

If you are in New York City tomorrow, you can also hear Darrin speak at the Geoweb Summit.

New York Times Tells How Maponics Neighborhoods Are Being Used for Social Networking

Gloria Dufield, Marketing Specialist — Mon, 14 May 2012 18:21:21 +0000

Did you catch the New York Times Saturday? If not, you missed this great article. In it, social networking site Nextdoor tells how they are using Maponics Neighborhoods to let people connect with neighbors online (while also maintaining a comfortable level of personal privacy). Read the full article here: Meet Your Neighbors, if Only Online

We often say how inspired we are by what our customers are doing. This is another great example! We’re happy we can play a role in helping people feel a greater sense of community.

Interested in learning more about how social networking companies are using culturally relevant boundaries to help people connect? Download this (free) article which appeared in GeoWorld magazine “Where Are Your Friends? Social Networking in Social Spaces”.

Maponics CEO to speak at Geoweb Summit May 17th

Gloria Dufield, Marketing Specialist — Thu, 03 May 2012 18:53:49 +0000

Maponics CEO, Darrin Clement, will be speaking at the Geoweb Summit for the second year in a row this May 17^th. As part of the ”Local Mapping Data” panel, Darrin will be joined by Nick Brachet of Skyhook and Tyler Bell of Factual.

Local Mapping Data Panel
Date: Thursday, May 17^th, 2012
Time: 4:40 PM – 5:30 PM
Location: Dumbo Spot, Brooklyn, New York

An evening event that goes from 3 – 9 PM, the Geoweb Summit includes four panel sessions and two keynotes. This year’s event features speakers from PlaceIQ, ESRI, ThinkNear, HopStop and more.

Planning on attending? Now’s the time to sign up! They are offering 40% off registration through next Monday, May 7^thonly. To register and receive discount follow this link: http://geowebsummit.eventbrite.com/?discount=Maponics

Can’t make this one? Darrin will be speaking at a total of four conferences over the next two months. Details on these events will be posted on the Maponics Blog soon – alongside announcements via Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. A complete list of all events Maponics plans to attend in 2012 is also available on our Events page.

If you are attending an upcoming conference and would like to meet with Darrin, please email marketing@maponics.com

Maponics Now Offering Parcel Boundaries

Johanna Hunter, Product Manger — Tue, 01 May 2012 15:57:01 +0000

Many of you have asked for parcel boundaries, and we’re happy to announce that we now offer them!

We know that being able to source all of your map data from one company saves you a lot of time and paperwork. With the addition of Parcel Boundaries from Digital Map Products, we now offer a complete geo-stack of boundary geography for property–related businesses. Combine this parcel data with our ZIP Codes, neighborhoods, subdivisions and school boundaries, and you have everything you need for:

Detailed valuation analysis
Comprehensive resource allocation planning
Targeted real estate search and map display
Highly accurate location matching (geocoding)

Some key features of this parcel boundary data include:

Over 121 million parcels
Quarterly updates and continual coverage expansion
Direct sourcing from individual counties and townships
APN, FIPS and shape geometry
Delivery in shapefile format

Interested in learning more about Parcel Boundaries from Maponics? Want to explore our full map data offering for property-related business? Contact us, and we’ll get back to you right away.

Shopping Boundaries Help Target Serial Shoppers

Gloria Dufield, Marketing Specialist — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 18:51:35 +0000

Location based marketers have a tough job designing campaigns around users because you don’t want to offer a discount to someone who was already about to purchase your product. For example, targeting anyone who comes within 500 feet of your big-box store is potentially redundant – they were already there to shop at your store. You might nudge them toward a particular product, but such targeting isn’t getting them there in the first place. Random emails to them when they are not even close to your store have the inertia problem: unless your offer is truly amazing, they probably won’t get off the couch to drive to your store.

There is a better way to target: shopping boundaries. We all know shopping districts or malls where there are many stores, restaurants and other consumer services all in one tight geography. People in these areas are likely there either to work or to shop. And if they are shopping, they are likely to go to multiple venues. In these cases, it’s easier to nudge them into your store, even if that’s not why they originally went out. Essentially, you are battling for share of wallet at that point because the inertia of leaving the house has already been overcome.

We offer over three thousand of the highest-trafficked shopping boundaries in the United States and Canada with expansion every quarter. These predefined geofences are easy for marketers to incorporate to improve mobile targeting and promotions, without requiring custom infrastructure for each store. Once a user crosses into one of these geofences, their propensity to respond to your marketing increases.

Interested in Shopping Boundaries? Contact us to learn about these and other geofences to assist you in your geotargeted marketing initiatives.

Maponics is Expanding and We Need You!

Gloria Dufield, Marketing Specialist — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 13:16:59 +0000

We just completed a stellar first quarter. With 2012 initiatives under a full head of steam, we are excited to announce our expansion and new career opportunities. We are looking to fill new roles with enthusiastic and motivated individuals. Below we are highlighting a few of these jobs but please visit Maponics Careers page for all openings, how to apply and additional details.

Software Systems Engineer

The Software Systems Engineer is responsible for design and development activities at a systems level and for crafting software that is well written, functional, efficient, and clearly documented while exceeding the stated requirements. A key element of this role is working in a Geographic Information Systems (GIS) environment that involves large amounts of data in spatial/relational databases. Initial focus will be on expanding and maintaining the Maponics Java toolset and utilizing rapid prototyping techniques to develop new product concepts.

Spatial Analyst (2 Openings)

This position is responsible for the creation and management of spatial databases in support of emerging Maponics product lines in a rapid prototyping, fast-paced environment. As part of the Product Development team, you will be required to wear many hats and your projects and duties will shift frequently. Some projects will involve SQL-intensive effort, while others might involve processing massive amounts of data in a short time, and other projects may even require basic digitizing and data QC.

Production Cartographer

This multifaceted role will be responsible for the identification, acquisition and maintenance of spatial data resources and utilizing those resources in the technical building and maintenance of Maponics spatial data products.

Visit our Careers page today for additional openings in Sales, Marketing and Accounting.

Foursquare Hack Day Project Using Maponics Neighborhoods

Johanna Hunter, Product Manger — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 13:07:41 +0000

We wanted to point you to an interesting internal project from engineers at Foursquare using Maponics Neighborhood Boundary data. Engineers matched 1,500,000,000 check-ins globally to the neighborhoods in which they took place. Using the resulting data, they determined the top categories based on location check-ins in each neighborhood and created a profile that reflects how people work and play in that neighborhood.

Algorithmically, they were then able to compare neighborhoods across different cities. For example, they determined which three neighborhoods in San Francisco were most similar to New York City’s East Village based on top check-in categories.

Want to know the three neighborhoods in San Francisco most similar to the East Village? Get the results and learn more at Foursquare’s Neighborhood Experiment.

Visit our Customer Use page for more interesting uses of neighborhood boundaries.

Nationwide Subdivision Boundaries Coverage Up 75% – Massive Expansion in CA, NY and Many Other States

Johanna Hunter, Product Manger — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 13:52:52 +0000

Today we are thrilled to announce that Maponics Subdivision Boundaries ^TM, the only nationwide subdivision boundaries dataset, has reached over 500,000 subdivisions. That’s a 75% increase since the end of last year! This expansion includes a 600% increase in the number of subdivisions for California. And comparable growth in New Jersey, New York, Tennessee, Michigan, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Maryland and several other states.

Have you been waiting to add subdivisions to your application? Now is the time to sign up!

Subdivisions represent the most granular level of geography in real estate comparison. They are even more local than neighborhoods. When you offer search, display, or analysis by subdivision, you empower people to cut through endless data and listings to make concrete decisions. You give them what they need to convert.

In the past, there was no practical option for companies looking for standardized subdivision boundary data for the entire US. Which is why we took on the creation of a uniform, nationwide subdivision boundaries database last year.

Launched last June, Maponics Subdivision Boundaries now features 508,428 real estate subdivisions in the 692 most-populous counties across 46 states. Each record contains a name, boundary, alternate names (if applicable), and centroid. It also contains corresponding U.S. Census Bureau data, such as State and County, to facilitate easy tie-in with other data grouped by Census geography.

In addition to Subdivision Boundaries, Maponics offers a complete geo-stack of boundary geographies ideal for real estate applications like: search & map display, trend & analysis reporting and automated valuation modeling. Many customers come to us for multiple datasets, including:

School Attendance Zones & School District Boundaries
Neighborhood Boundaries
ZIP Code Boundaries
Subdivision Boundaries

In fact, the Top 3 real estate websites, Zillow, Realtor.com and Trulia.com, all depend on Maponics data to boost their revenue. So do back-end real estate leaders Realtors Property Resource^{TM (}RPR) and Lender Processing Services (LPS).

Have a Subdivision Boundaries question? Click here to get a quote or learn more.

Maponics Events and Travels for April

Gloria Dufield, Marketing Specialist — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 17:33:20 +0000

The 2012 conference season is starting to pickup. We wanted to let you know about three upcoming events on Maponics schedule for April.

Johanna Hunter, Maponics Product Manger, will be attending the O’Reilly Where Conference: The Art and Business of Location in San Francisco. This three day conference, April 2-4, is the must-attend event for those interested in location-aware technologies. Leading experts across multiple industries will take part in workshops, panels, product demos, informal “Birds of a Feather” sessions and more. Attending Where and want to meet with Johanna? Contact her at johannahunter@maponics.com

On April 18^th, Mark Dykstra, Maponics Director of Sales, will be in Toronto for a Location Based Marketing Association event. Mark will join Alexis Zamkow from Canada Post, John Fisher of DMTI Spatial and Yelp Canada’s Vivek Srivastava on the panel entitled Geofencing: A GeoSocial World.

You may remember LBMA from earlier this year. We sponsored podcast episodes 59 through 63. If you missed the podcasts and Darrin’s interview on January 9, they are archived and available here.

We look forward to seeing Asif and Rob and if you are in Toronto join us from 3-7 pm at the KPMG / Bay Adelaide Centre. There is still time to register.

Maponics is pleased to sponsor the NEURISA and VT Center for Geographic Information (VCGI) Ignite Spatial Vermont 2012. The event will be on Tuesday, April 17th from 7-9 pm at the Capitol Plaza Hotel in Montpelier. This year the winner of the VT College and University Student Map Contest will be announced during the event which is free and open to the public. You can register here.

We have many exciting speaking engagements and conferences we are attending this year. If you want to see our full schedule and what we have lined up for May, visit our Events page. Keep current on all our travels and company news by following us on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.

If you are attending an upcoming conference and would like to meet with us, please email marketing@maponics.com