UPDATE: Watch video of the panel below.

For both businesses and consumers, geolocation apps and services are a dime a dozen these days. But many of these apps and tools serve to benefit both when used consistently and correctly. Much like social media itself, geolocation is a two-way entity.

“Geolocation makes it easier for consumers to get the services they want nearby and for local businesses to reach the consumers in their area,” Eli Portnoy, CEO of Culver City-based mobile marketing startup Thinknear told me matter-of-factly.

As consumers become increasingly engaged with smartphones and other mobile devices, geolocation will have a growing influence on commerce. For most businesses and services, location — and circumstance — means everything. More than one-third of U.S. adults (35 percent) are smartphone users according to a July 2011 Pew Internet report. Consumers are always on the hunt for quality goods and services at reasonable prices. As consumers grow accustomed to the “smart” aspect of always-connected, GPS-enabled mobile devices, the bargains appear at their fingertips and it only becomes a matter of convenience. As consumers discover the power of smartphones beyond texts, emails and phone calls, shopping habits change.

In the same Pew survey, 25 percent of smartphone owners indicated a preference for using the internet on their phone rather than their computer. This is likely not just a matter of convenience, it’s based on better circumstantial results. The top search results for “yogurt” on a home or office computer likely yield the Wikipedia entry, and links to the Dannon and Yoplait websites. But the same search from a smartphone directs the user to the nearest fro-yo shop. Geolocation is a win-win: consumers can find what they want and need at their fingertips while businesses can acquire new regulars by dangling their goods and services right in front of the smartphone user around the corner.

Geoloco & Business:

Do you see a map and a location listing for your business when you search Google? If not, you can list all physical locations on Google for free: www.google.com/placesforbusiness.

Gowalla, Foursquare, YP, Yelp…. Help!?! Forget about your business for a minute and try out each of these services via their mobile apps as a consumer. There are many tools, including these, which make it easier for consumers to get what they want. Search for your business on these applications? Is it there? Is the listing accurate? Not everything in the world is automated (yet) and so it’s never a surprise when new stores replace old ones but the old listing remains.

Your business (if it relies on a physical location) may only have one physical location but by making sure it’s populated and using any and all geolocation services at its disposal, you are doing the best you can to bring your offering to potential consumers on their terms. Foursquare may have more users than Gowalla but your next customer might discover you through Gowalla. Either way, these serendipitous, location-based discoveries often lead users to return and more importantly to share their experience with others via social media and word of mouth.

I was honored to be a panelist at this month’s Social Media Club Los Angeles event on geolocation, a topic I’ve been obsessed with for quite some time (it’s the subject of my Master’s Thesis). I wrote this post in advance of the July 26 SMCLA event.

See my photos from past years at SXSW

The trip began with an amazing takeoff directly into the fading sun over the Pacific. This would be the last time the sun set before Daylight Savings time kicked in. Got in to Austin and met up with Jory, provider of a fine crash pad for the duration of my stay. Then began a serious of meetups, events, and parties: All Hat III, which was a priceless opportunity to visit with many of the folks I most admire in the interactive space who happen to share a passion and commitment to do-gooding.

Here’s a photo Geoff Livingston took of his partners at Zoetica Media. I was standing right next to them. No really. You won’t see me in any of my photos posted here (and I’m not sure who hijacked my camera and interviewed Jonathan Grubb of RVIPLounge – see at bottom). But as always happens, the aftermath of SXSW will carry on to Facebook and Twitter and into another season of opportunity and new connections.

I created a truly ridiculous agenda of all things I RSVP’d for or intended to go to. It’s included at the bottom of this post to give you a taste of just how extensively big corporations and smaller startups catered to SXSW Interactive attendees this year.

Among the highlights was the CNN Grill, which took over a restaurant two blocks from the convention center and turned it into a CNN Disneyland with free food and drink service throughout the afternoon and late night for industry folk and others lucky enough to have a pass.

That’s Percy von Lipinski in the video above. I was seated at his table on my first visit to #CNNGrill soon after he was presented with an award for CNN iReporter Original Reporting Award and naturally, had to stick my flip cam in his face.

I did not have a SXSW Interactive badge this year as I had in the past since I failed to apply as press by the deadline. I thought, maybe I could take a year off (ha!). But the other special badges, VIP treatment, and access I was offered for taking such menial steps as RSVP-ing via Eventbrite more than made up for it.

CNN — they must be made of money — ensured that everyone would be happy with their grill (at other times known as MAX’s Wine Dive). Everything on the prepared-to-order menu (food and drink) was gratis and there was WiFi and two power strips at every table. But even the service and hosts were gracious — imported from NYC via Danny Meyer’s Union Square Hospitality Group — and there were live performances throughout the day. I showed up at the perfect time (according to my particular tastes) and caught a 40 minute or so acoustic set from Wisconsin-based awesomeband Locksley, and then a set from The Civil Wars (see video above), who barely managed to get away from me and onto the next before I could – natch – stick my flip cam in their faces. The CNN Grill was apparently first conceived for the 2008 Democratic Convention in Denver. But man, what good buzz they built by hosting the mad swarms of geeks and mediaites at SXSW.

Video from the RVIPLounge below. I recommend checking out this one as well — from the inside (same night).

Click “show earlier events” and scroll up to view my March 13-17 agenda. Click on any event to expand details

That’s all I’ve got time for now with extra special thanks for making things happen to theMIX agency, SMC, Wine Library product and crew, The Force Agency (of which I’m now a card-carrying part of), Gowalla & Foursquare (I adore both equally but in comparison to the SXSW deluge of use checking in now feels relatively pointless), Nicole and all the great Summit Series rockers at dinner at Lambert’s. And as always, thank you Google for helping me to never get lost and for Android. Now I’m getting sentimental. Where’s my award already?

Location technologies are transforming how we experience, navigate, and ultimately better our world. From the global to the local, here are #10Ways geolocation is a positive force for good.

Social media has changed the world. It has revolutionized communications on a global scale, and the transformation continues with every status update, blog post, and video stream. The global citizenry has become a global network.

Since becoming widely adopted just a couple years ago, social media has supercharged social action, cause marketing, and social entrepreneurship. Indeed, the true value hasn’t been the technology itself but how we’ve used it. Today, a second wave of innovation is defining a new era and setting the stage for change over the coming decade.

Mobile technologies will extend the global online network to anyone with a mobile device while enabling countless local networks to form in the real world. We’ve decentralized media production and distribution. We’re doing the same for energy. And we’ll continue this trend for social networking, social action, and commerce.

The combined forces of smartphones, mobile broadband, and location-aware applications will connect us in more meaningful ways to the people, organizations, events, information, and companies that matter most to us—namely, those within a physical proximity of where we live and where we are. Can location-based services (LBS) change the world? Here are #10Ways:

1. Checking in for Good: If Gowalla and Foursquare have taught us anything, it’s that people respond to simple incentives. By offering badges, mayorships, and other intangible rewards, millions of people are checking in to the places they go. Apps like Whrrl take this a step further and enable like-minded “societies” to form on a local basis. The next step is for these apps to add greater purpose by encouraging more meaningful checkins and offering corresponding badges and stamps, thus mapping the cause universe. Or for a dedicated app to be developed that rewards conscious consumption, social responsibility, and civic engagement. Yes, the CauseWorld app features a cause element, but it’s not about cause-worthy places.

2. Eating Locally: Sustainability demands that we source our food as close to its point of production as possible. Many so-called locavores subscribe to the 100-mile diet, which requires that one “eat nothing—or almost nothing—but sustenance drawn from within 100 miles of their home.” Given the difficulty of accessing and verifying this information in order to live by this standard, there’s a geo-powered Locavore app. It gives you info on in-season foods, those coming in-season, farmer’s markets, and links to recipes. This rather simple app is clearly just the start. In time, location-aware apps will guide us not only to the grocery store or farmer’s market but through them. All the while identifying foods based on our particular diet or sensibility.

3. Political Organizing: In the next presidential election, politics will not only be local but location-enabled. We saw the power of social media in Obama’s 2008 landslide victory. In 2012, location-based apps and technologies will play a central role in how campaigns are organized, managed, and ultimately won. Much of this will be visible through mobile apps and location-aware browsers. Activists and volunteers will be more empowered. Voters will be more engaged in the moment, right down to casting their votes. Behind the scenes, though, we’ll see massive new sets of data available to campaigns for targeting, empowerment, and optimization. The party, candidate, and/or cause that has the best handle on geolocation will have a measurable advantage. (The Elections app will soon be updated for 2010.)

4. Finding Green Businesses: The web has effectively replaced the paper Yellow Pages as a way to find local businesses and services. However, this “stationary web” experience is quickly being supplanted by the mobile web and mobile applications, which give us access to this information when we most need it. The Yelp and Around Me apps are popular ways to find restaurants, coffee shops, or hotels wherever you are, but what about green-rated businesses? Greenopia has transformed its printed, local guides into a dynamic, nationwide mobile application that lets you find local, green-rated businesses in any category. No more paper and a much better experience. The Green Map app is another that facilitates discovery and connects us to local green environments.

5. Traveling More Efficiently: We’ve had access to GPS navigation systems and static traffic information for some time, but only now are we seeing the full potential of these technologies. With access to more detailed traffic information that is specific to your route and updated in real time, we can minimize congestion and maximize traffic flow (as much as physically possible). The new turn-by-turn MapQuest 4 Mobile app is a good start, as you can get traffic alerts specific to the route you program. However, user-generated information from apps like Trapster and Waze can crowdsource more specific details, such as whether to avoid an intersection due to a toxic chemical spill. Or, if you want to avoid automobiles altogether, Google Maps makes it easy to use public transportation and take a bike.

6. Scanning for Ethical Products: With online shopping, we’ve become accustomed to reading reviews and making comparisons before we buy. This can now be done in the physical world through games like MyTown and services like Stikybits. By scanning a product barcode using a smartphone camera, you can unlock a treasure of additional information (not to mention deals) that can help with your purchase. This might include where it was produced, how far it traveled, the reputation of the manufacturer, chemical contents, carbon footprint, or the full lifecycle analysis. Location-aware applications can also transform commerce itself by giving us better access to local inventories and locally-produced goods. Whether it’s fruits and vegetables or books and electronics, if something can be found within blocks of your current location, it makes no sense to ship it from afar.

7. Networking Neighborhoods: One of the hottest categories in geolocation is neighborhood networking. The vision for many of these apps is to strengthen the very fabric of our communities. With DeHood, you can keep track of what’s happening in your neighborhood, share your favorite places, and grease the wheels for actually meeting people. After all, if you’ve made contact through the app, it’s a lot easier to say “Hello” in the real world. Blasterous is another that lets you share information locally, whereas BlockChalk does this on an anonymous basis. Finally, NeighborGoods uses your street address to facilitate one-to-one borrowing and trading of useful stuff. In the end, making connections with your neighbors can lead to safer, more productive, and more sustainable communities.

8. Tracking Environmental Disasters: The size and scope of environmental disasters appears to be growing. In 2008, we had the Tennessee coal ash spill, which was billed as “the largest environmental disaster of its kind in the United States.” And that was before we realized it was three times bigger than originally estimated. More recently, the BP oil spill set daily records for “largest environmental disaster in the U.S. ever.” In each case, geolocation technologies can be used by engaged citizens to monitor and track the effects. They can be used by response teams to coordinate containment and cleanup efforts. Ultimately, these technologies can be used to accurately measure the size and impact of a disaster in order to better understand its damages and costs.

9. Viewing the World Through an Eco Lens: Augmented reality (AR) follows geolocation as one of the hot trends in mobile technology. It enables you to view the world through a smartphone camera (or similar device) and see layers of geo-specific content or information. One of the most popular apps is Layar, an augmented reality browser/platform that lets you choose specific data layers or experiences. The potential for green- and cause-related content is tremendous. You might view green-rated businesses, LEED-certified buildings, or virtual GHG emissions as they enter the atmosphere. Combined with smart meter technology, you could see the most efficient and inefficient homes around you in real time. And for the cynics among us, you could view our mountains, forests, rivers, and oceans as they once were…before the effects of climate change and so many environmental disasters.

10. Capturing the Moment: Better access to information about what’s happening around us—right now—can dramatically improve quality of life. This sense of “geospatial awareness” is possible through today’s smartphones, whereby a piece of content or information—a moment—is captured and preserved based on the unique time and place in which it occurred. It is essentially to document spacetime. Protests, natural disasters, sporting events, parties, political crises…real-time information about anything happening anywhere at any time, as well as the history of what happened. This will take several years and a number of different applications to realize. In the end, though, it will revolutionize how we access and consume content. It will complete the democratization and decentralization of news and information…based on time and location.

Cautionary note: Privacy is the single biggest issue in the LBS industry. It’s important to understand what information you are sharing with regard to your location and with whom.

Author’s note: We’ll be hosting geolocation events for Social Media Week in Los Angeles this September. This is the third in Max Gladwell‘s #10Ways series of distributed blog posts. It was published simultaneously on as many as 300 blogs.

Proclaiming the panel and 1,000 or so in the audience are not waking up, Arrington cues the YouTube video of Gundotra with Conan O’Brien when O’Brien visited the Googleplex earlier this month. Arrington then gets the crowd involved by declaring Facebook needs a better Android app and then prompting a Question Queue in which 3 HTC Sprint Evo phones are given away to the best questions. Only about 10 people line up to ask questions. Second question elicits some great under-breath commentary from the stage:

Q: “Is facebook evil?” Foursquare’s Dennis Crowley to Facebook VP Chris Cox: “this is where you shoot laser beams from your eyes.” Cox, after a long pause, answers “no.”

Later, Arrington interviews Tim Armstrong, CEO of AOL. “I got a little down yesterday,” Arrington slips in. “Something happened on this stage.” “Oh really, what happened” counters Armstrong… “do you want a hug?”

Steve Case and Mike Arrington:

Click here for the Day One post. Follow the action live below: