The Douchebag badge on Foursquare is getting a lot of attention these days.  I’m not sure if it’s because of the controversial word, or because it’s so damn funny (well at least I think it is), one thing is for sure, there is something to learn from the “Douchebag” badge when creating an iPhone app.

1) Get people talking by creating something equivalent to the “Douchebag” badge.  This was really smart from a marketing perspective - create a badge that gets people talking.  I came into the office and some friends, some who weren’t on Foursquare, immediately interrogated me: “How did you get that badge?” or better yet “What is it?”  This got me talking about Foursquare, what it is, how I got the badge - amazing.  No viral optimization made this happen except someone noticing the Douchebag badge on Facebook. I’m not sure if this got the ones who weren’t on Foursquare to use the app, but I’m sure the users who were already using the app, were intrigued.

Why does this matter? My theory for why Foursquare is taking off is because of all the offline conversations that are generated from the app and it’s broadcasted social experiences on Facebook.  If your app is not “Featured” on the App Store or if you’re not spending $10K to get to the top 20 within an app category, it’s REALLY hard to get noticed.  Generate some conversation and your app might organically grow.

2) The marketing of social capital - in this case, the badge, matters.  This is an extension to #1.  The fact that a badge appears on Facebook and friends can see what badges you’re getting, adds a lot of value to the solo-user experience. If the name of the badge was anything other that Douchebag, it wouldn’t have generated as much conversation.  The guys who got it (me, included) are thinking “Whoa, cool!”.  The women, well, I can’t speak on behalf of them, but I can only imagine they are feeling some sense of emotion around the existence of the app badge.  They created something that pushed the boundaries - and in some cases, pissing people off.  The fact that the acquiring a badge with “Douchebag” in the name is attached to your profile (indirectly your social capital) and stirs some emotion is a good thing for creating loyalty to your app(or no loyalty if you don’t like it, for that matter).  Whether foursquare can do this in the long run as they become more mainstream is yet to be determined, but carefully picking the name so it stirs some sense of emotion is a good thing.

Oh, and those wondering how to get the Douchebag - just go to to Tipsy Pig.