How to Update Foursquare for Free

[Shelly]

Does anyone know how to update business information in Foursquare for free? Our business location moved and I need to update the address and remove an old photo of the front of our previous location which is being populated in Bing (we actually get decent traffic from Bing so I am mostly concerned with this). I'm out of ideas and Bing states we have to remove the image directly through Foursquare.

So far I have tried:
7/8/21 Suggested an edit
8/18/21 Created an account and submitted a claim to https://support.foursquare.com/hc/en-us/requests/new?ticket_form_id=11424 (as suggested by Nyagoslav Zhekov during the 2020 BrightLocal Local Search Summit)
10/6/21 Tweeted @4sqSupport asking for help managing a listing (as suggested by Nyagoslav Zhekov during the 2020 BrightLocal Local Search Summit)
10/18/21 Submitted a standard ticket through the contact us form (said I would hear back via email in 72 hours. Still nothing)

Claiming is very difficult because we have an automated phone system and it seems to only give me the phone option (though it says cell phones are ok, I am assuming it wants the business line).

 

[ErinJones]

Hey Shelly!

Admittedly, Twitter and their direct support would be my first two recommendations. I don't think there's a way to update a listing if you don't own it. Most of your other options will have a cost associated unless you can find someone at Foursquare that will help you get around the charges.

I'm guessing you've already tried this, but if you visit Claim your business on Foursquare there is an option to pay to expedite the claim process. I believe it is about $20 -have you been able to get to the point where this is an option? It is worth giving the phone verification option a try, there may be a workaround. There are quite a few local businesses that are cell phone or automated/VOIP systems, hopefully they have an option for this.

You can also try updating via Yext (Foursquare | Update Your Foursquare For Business Listings - Yext), but there will be a cost associated here as well.

Finally, you can attempt the squeaky wheel approach. Keep pushing back on the tickets & Twitter, and they may give in and help you out.

We've got a few team members looking at some potential out-of-the-box options internally here, and I'll update you as soon as I have some more info.

 

[Shelly]

Hey Shelly!

Admittedly, Twitter and their direct support would be my first two recommendations. I don't think there's a way to update a listing if you don't own it. Most of your other options will have a cost associated unless you can find someone at Foursquare that will help you get around the charges.

I'm guessing you've already tried this, but if you visit Claim your business on Foursquare there is an option to pay to expedite the claim process. I believe it is about $20 -have you been able to get to the point where this is an option? It is worth giving the phone verification option a try, there may be a workaround. There are quite a few local businesses that are cell phone or automated/VOIP systems, hopefully they have an option for this.

You can also try updating via Yext (Foursquare | Update Your Foursquare For Business Listings - Yext), but there will be a cost associated here as well.

Finally, you can attempt the squeaky wheel approach. Keep pushing back on the tickets & Twitter, and they may give in and help you out.

We've got a few team members looking at some potential out-of-the-box options internally here, and I'll update you as soon as I have some more info.

Thank you so much for the detailed response, Erin!

The only option I have when claiming is to enter a phone number. It does say cell phones work, but I am not sure if I can use a number that is outside of the main business number. Knowing the other local platforms as well as I do, I am assuming it has to be the business line.

I found a way to escalate my 2nd ticket which I did. I also asked for help claiming the listing. For now, I will continue with the squeaky wheel approach but will also see if there is a way to get the business to turn off their automated system for a bit to claim.

If you (or anyone else) learn about any other options, I'd love to hear them. It doesn't seem like it should be this hard!

 

[Nyagoslav]

Does anyone know how to update business information in Foursquare for free? Our business location moved and I need to update the address and remove an old photo of the front of our previous location which is being populated in Bing (we actually get decent traffic from Bing so I am mostly concerned with this). I'm out of ideas and Bing states we have to remove the image directly through Foursquare.

So far I have tried:
7/8/21 Suggested an edit
8/18/21 Created an account and submitted a claim to https://support.foursquare.com/hc/en-us/requests/new?ticket_form_id=11424 (as suggested by Nyagoslav Zhekov during the 2020 BrightLocal Local Search Summit)
10/6/21 Tweeted @4sqSupport asking for help managing a listing (as suggested by Nyagoslav Zhekov during the 2020 BrightLocal Local Search Summit)
10/18/21 Submitted a standard ticket through the contact us form (said I would hear back via email in 72 hours. Still nothing)

Claiming is very difficult because we have an automated phone system and it seems to only give me the phone option (though it says cell phones are ok, I am assuming it wants the business line).

Hi Shelly,

Unfortunately, at present there is no way to claim a single listing for free (there is a way to do that for multiple listings that are part of a chain though).

In order to edit a listing, you can use the "Suggest an edit" option on the listing page. Note that Foursquare has a user trust system in place, so the more trusted the account you use to suggest such edits, the faster the turnaround time for these edits to go live would be. An account gains trust by making good quality edits over a period of time. You can check your account's scores here, for instance. Alternatively, you could try and get a few different people to suggest the same edits, to potentially bump the edits up in the queue of edits that would then be reviewed by a Superuser or by a Foursquare moderator.

Unfortunately, Foursquare's support has been hard to reach over the past 1 year. Thus, waiting for their response might not be the best path at present.

P.S. I just wanted to make a small note that the presentation you were talking about was done at the Whitespark Local Search Summit

 

[Shelly]

Hi Shelly,

Unfortunately, at present there is no way to claim a single listing for free (there is a way to do that for multiple listings that are part of a chain though).

In order to edit a listing, you can use the "Suggest an edit" option on the listing page. Note that Foursquare has a user trust system in place, so the more trusted the account you use to suggest such edits, the faster the turnaround time for these edits to go live would be. An account gains trust by making good quality edits over a period of time. You can check your account's scores here, for instance. Alternatively, you could try and get a few different people to suggest the same edits, to potentially bump the edits up in the queue of edits that would then be reviewed by a Superuser or by a Foursquare moderator.

Unfortunately, Foursquare's support has been hard to reach over the past 1 year. Thus, waiting for their response might not be the best path at present.

P.S. I just wanted to make a small note that the presentation you were talking about was done at the Whitespark Local Search Summit

Nyagoslav,
Thank you so much for chiming in with your expansive knowledge! I refer back to my notes on that presentation very often. (And, I apologize for the Whitespak fumble. I read a lot of articles and watch a lot of presentations. I was bound to get confused at some point )

Since this is impacting our Bing presence I will talk to my client about paying for the updates. I have been considering that anyway since there are still a lot of incorrect address listings out there due to our move but I have been able to do a lot manually.

Thanks again for sharing your knowledge!
Best,
Shelly

 

[Shelly]

UPDATE: I have gained access to the FourSquare account! I believe it was the result of using the contact form to submit a claim asking for management rights (though the email didn't reference which of my messages it was in response to).

In this case, it seems persistence paid off!
Thanks again to all that chimed in on this one. It was helpful.