Foursquare partners with Bravo TV

Great exposure for geo-location startup. Nice to see line between TV and mobile Web blurring

Location-based startup, Foursquare is definitely starting to step up its business plans.  On Monday, the company announced a partnership with Bravo TV which would encourage its users to check into places relevant to Bravo TV shows including Top Chef, The Real Housewives and Shear Genius, reports the NYT. 

For Foursquare, this is great.  The startup will get some great exposure as Bravo runs on-air ads trying to get its viewers to sign up for Foursquare so they can participate in the contests.  The startup currently has a loyal userbase in the geo-location space, but this could potentially bring in a bunch of new users, giving it an edge against competitors including Gowalla.  

At the same time, Bravo TV probably sees the appeal for teaming up with a geo-location application so its users can further be engaged with the channel, beyond only when they are tuned in on TV.  Users can access and participate with Bravo while on the road playing the Foursquare game.

In case you're not fully familiar with how Foursquare works, basically you download the application to your smartphone (Foursquare can run on iPhone, BlackBerry, Android and Palm, naming a few), and then you check into the location you're at.  Say I check into a bar, Foursquare detects my location with GPS and then I can interact in certain ways.  Sometimes you can find tips on the best drink at the bar or the user could earn a special badge for checking into that location.  

“We really want to tap into the power of Foursquare by engaging their audiences and bringing our Bravo viewers these unique experiences on a national level,” Ellen Stone, Bravo’s senior vice president for marketing, told the NYTimes.  

In the end, this is great for Foursquare until Facebook decides to step in the geo-location space, which could definitely crush the startup.  Also, another great example of the lines blurring between television and the Web, and in this case, the mobile Web.