Advertisers are constantly seeking innovative ways to connect with their audience. One approach that has transformed marketing across channels– including digital, out-of-home, TV, and more– is location-based targeting. By leveraging location data, this strategy enables marketers to deliver personalized and relevant ads based on where people are or where they’ve been.
In this blog, we’ll explain in more detail what location-based targeting is and how it can help you take advantage of key advertising opportunities in the New Year. For more free targeting strategies and recommendations, download our Q1 2025 Location-Based Targeting Guide.
What is Location-Based Targeting?
Location-based targeting is a marketing strategy that uses real-world location data to gain insights into consumer preferences and buying behaviors. This allows you to more accurately segment and target specific audiences who are more likely to engage with your ads.
Two broad forms of location-based targeting include 1) audience targeting and 2) proximity targeting.
Audience Targeting
Audience targeting takes into account people’s past behaviors and actions, such as frequent visits to a coffee chain, or ventures to competitive retail locations. Understanding historical behavior gives marketers insights into consumer habits, unlocking a fuller picture of their target audience.
As consumer behavior changes, marketers can maintain precision in their targeting by using location data that dynamically updates to reflect shifting behavior. For example, consider consumers who regularly visited the gym on a weekly basis during the first half of the year but haven’t returned in some time. These individuals would no longer be categorized as frequent gym-goers and could instead be reclassified as lapsed gym visitors.
This understanding enables highly relevant targeting—such as offering promotions to entice lapsed visitors to come back to the gym or sending event invitations to engage active members. By aligning messaging with each audience’s current stage in their customer lifecycle, businesses can ensure their campaigns resonate more effectively, driving higher engagement and conversions. In fact, 90% of marketers saw higher sales and 84% reported increased engagement when using location-based advertising.
Proximity Targeting
While geotargeting refers to delivering ads to consumers based on a broader geographical area such as a city or a state, proximity targeting takes a more granular approach where ads are triggered based on a person’s real-time location, such as near or in the vicinity of a store, event, or trade area. A common technique for proximity targeting is geofencing, which creates a virtual boundary, such as a radius or polygon, around a specific location. Ads are only triggered and served to users when they are within this defined area.
Proximity targeting offers several effective applications in digital marketing, including:
- Competitive conquesting: Engage consumers while they’re at competitor locations, offering incentives to switch to your products or services;
- Event-based advertising: Keep your brand top-of-mind during events, encouraging attendees to purchase your products while they’re there;
- Location-specific offers: Deliver personalized ads to your target audience when they’re near your business, encouraging in-store visits and driving foot traffic.
Both proximity targeting and audience targeting can be used to reach engaged audiences when they’re ready to buy, delivering highly contextual messages that drive action and increase ROI. Now that we’ve gone over the basics, let’s dive into how these location-based targeting strategies can elevate your Q1 marketing campaigns.
Q1 Targeting Strategies
The first three months of the year bring exciting advertising opportunities for marketers – New Year’s, The Super Bowl, Valentine’s Day, Easter, March Madness, and St. Patrick’s Day, among others.
These key tentpole events drive billions of dollars in consumer spending each year. In fact, in 2024 consumers planned to spend over $22 billion dollars on Easter alone on items like candy, gifts, spring apparel, and food. Super Bowl? Estimated over $17 billion in consumer spending in 2024, an entire billion more than in 2023.
There’s no question that Q1 is a big season for advertisers, but how do you make sure your campaigns are seen amongst the noise? By leveraging location-based targeting, you can ensure your ads resonate with consumers actively seeking your products and services, leading to greater campaign success and improved return on ad spend (ROAS).
Creative Targeting Strategies Across Industries
Retail
Audience targeting: Build audiences of “Galentine’s Day” party planners – females ages 18-34 – who celebrate friendship by visiting trendy brunch spots, wine bars, and party supply stores around Valentine’s Day.
Proximity Targeting: Attract fashion influencers shopping at competitor stores in the mall before New York Fashion Week by offering exclusive deals on your latest collection to drive traffic to your store.
Dining
Audience targeting: Reach young adults ages 18-24 who have shown a history of dining out at top spring break destination spots, with enticing offers to promote visits to your restaurant.
Proximity targeting: Promote special game day offers to 21+ consumers currently near your sports bar or restaurant chain to encourage a visit while they’re looking for places to eat, drink, and watch the big game.
CPG
Audience targeting: Engage healthy grocery shoppers who are regularly seen at local farmers markets and organic grocery stores during the New Year, and also have an online interest in healthy eating.
Proximity targeting: Reach NCAA college basketball attendees while they’re at tournament venues to increase brand awareness of your beverages, snacks, or basketball apparel.
Saving time planning and executing Q1 campaigns
As you plan your Q1 campaigns, Foursquare makes it easy to access creative and proven location-based targeting strategies that deliver 4x greater scale and over 200% ROI, according to Forrester.
Download our free Q1 2025 Location-Based Targeting Guide for dozens of audience segmentation and geofencing strategies focused on key advertising moments in Q1.
Whether you’re looking to streamline your Q1 planning or find ways to enhance your targeting mid-campaign, Foursquare Audience and Proximity can help you save time and effort so you can focus on what really matters. If you’re looking to measure the success of your ads in driving foot traffic and sales to optimize campaigns in-flight, check out Foursquare Attribution, the leading omnichannel measurement solution.
