In today’s world, data is crucial for helping us understand things better. One type of information that’s particularly useful for businesses, governments, and people is Point of Interest (POI) data. Whether exploring a new city, planning to open a store, or researching a city, POI data can help you learn a lot.
How people interact with businesses and places around them has changed a lot. Instead of calling a taxi on the street, many people now use ride-share services like Uber and Grab. Instead of waiting in line or making reservations at their favorite restaurants, people now have their food brought right to their homes. There’s an app for almost everything, from buying clothes to getting things done, finding help with cleaning or laundry, and much more. It’s hard to believe that there was a time when these services didn’t exist.
With more and more services being delivered to people’s homes, knowing accurate location information becomes essential. Knowing exactly where something is would make it easier to provide these services. For example, Uber drivers need to know exactly where a restaurant is so that they can pick up their next passenger. And it makes sense for a fast-food chain to open a new store in a growing residential area with few food options. POI data is the main focus of this guide. We will discuss its types, uses, collection methods, challenges, and future applications.
What is Point of Interest (POI) Data?
POI data is details about specific physical locations that interest individuals or businesses. These places include restaurants, parks, hospitals, schools, museums, landmarks, and more. Any area that might attract attention or provide a service can be considered a POI.
The Data Typically Includes:
- Name: The place’s name (e.g., “Central Park”).
- Address: The street address or coordinates of the POI.
- Category: The type of place it is (e.g., restaurant, park, hospital).
- Operational Details: Data like opening hours, contact numbers, and website links.
- Attributes: Additional features include parking, Wi-Fi availability, and wheelchair accessibility.
- Ratings and Reviews: User-generated data reflecting the quality of the POI.
What Are the Types of POI Data?
You can sort POI data into different types based on its use and the kind of information it gives. Here are some common groups:
Type of Place POI Data
- Shops, restaurants, hotels, and other businesses
- Schools, parks, libraries, government offices, and hospitals
- Monuments, museums, landmarks, and other tourist spots
- Airports, train stations, bus stops, and parking areas
Changing POI Data
- Information that changes often, like current traffic conditions, public transport schedules, or live event data
- Information that stays the same over time, like the location of a historical monument or a well-established restaurant
Location POI Data
- Points in cities or crowded areas
- Points in less crowded or rural areas
- Points related to sea navigation, like lighthouses, ports, or coastal facilities
How is POI Data Generated?
You can gather POI data from various sources. Companies and sellers collect or obtain this information using different methods. Let’s examine some of the most common ways POI data is collected.
Data Extraction from Web Sources
To gather data, some companies use tools to automatically extract points of interest from websites like Google Maps and OpenStreetMap. However, some websites try to stop this by blocking the IP addresses of the data extractors. This method takes a lot of time and effort and may not be suitable for large-scale projects that require a lot of data. The data collected from these sources also needs a lot of preparation before you can use it for analysis.
Google Maps and similar services require businesses and places to keep their information current. If they do, the data can become old and inaccurate, causing problems with the information provided.
User Generated
In the last ten years, more and more people have been using social media and sharing information about where they are. Many companies use this information or buy it from others with apps that collect it. Remember when you told your favorite social media app where you were? Someone else might use that information.
These companies record where people say they are and make their notes about popular places. But sometimes, the information people give isn’t exactly right because of the device they used, the app’s rules, or how exact they were. Mistakes can also make the information less accurate.
Government Directories
Many governments require businesses to provide their addresses during the registration process. Businesses use this information to create a dataset of business locations, which is publicly available in some countries. However, companies may need to update this information when they close, grow, or move to a new location so that the data can be updated and accurate over time.
Manual Verification
Some companies pay people to walk around cities with a particular phone app to add new places or check if existing ones are correct. This way, it is very accurate and keeps the information updated. Using this method also protects people’s privacy because the app only collects the location of places and doesn’t track individual people.
What are the Ways to Represent POI Data?
You can place POIs (Points of Interest) on a map using different formats, each with its way of showing information and detail. These formats allow POI attributes to describe a location on a map and how it relates to other places nearby.
- Coordinates
Latitude and longitude (Lat/Long) are numbers that tell us exactly where a place is on the Earth. We can find these numbers using devices like smartphones or mapping services. We can also use these numbers to create a virtual border around a real place called a Geofence. That helps businesses understand and study different locations in an area.
- Postal Codes
Another way to pinpoint a place is by using its address, which includes a PIN, Postal, or Zip Code assigned by the government. This system assists mail carriers in sorting and delivering mail efficiently, but it is now widely used to locate points of interest. However, there needs to be a global standard for postal codes. A postal code can identify an individual housing block in some countries, like Singapore. On the other hand, Hong Kong, a territory of similar size and population, doesn’t use the postal code system at all. In most places, a postal code alone may not be enough to locate a specific Point-of-Interest, but you can use it as an “official geofence” in data analysis.
- Geohash
Geohash is a system for describing any location in the world using a short code made of letters and numbers. The code can represent a broad area or a specific point depending on the length. Geohash divides the world into small grids, making it helpful in pinpointing particular places or setting up boundaries quickly.
- H3
H3 is a way to organize places on a map. It uses hexagonal shapes instead of squares, like a honeycomb. Uber created H3 to determine the best ride prices and which driver to send were. They shared it with everyone in early 2020. It’s helpful for quickly finding places in a circle and measuring distances between locations.
What Are the Applications of POI Data?
POI data is valuable and has various uses in industries. Here’s how you can use it:
Navigation and Mapping
- POI data is essential for GPS and maps. It helps people find places, plan routes, and discover nearby services.
- Google Maps, Apple Maps, and Waze use POI data to give accurate and up-to-date information.
Urban Planning and Development
- Urban planners use POI data to understand what services are available in a city and plan new developments.
- It helps create better cities by ensuring people access essential healthcare, education, and recreation services.
Retail and Business Analysis
- Businesses use POI data to find the best places for new stores or franchises.
- Retailers can learn how many people visit certain places to improve their stores.
Real Estate
- Real estate professionals use POI data to see how good different neighborhoods are. Being close to good places can make a property more valuable.
- Buyers and renters often look for schools, parks, and grocery stores when choosing a home.
Tourism and Hospitality
- POI data helps tourists find attractions, restaurants, and hotels when visiting new places.
- The hospitality industry uses POI data to tell travelers about attractions close to where they are staying.
Emergency Services
- Emergency response teams use POI data to find hospitals, police stations, fire stations, and other essential buildings fast.
- POI data can also help during disasters by providing information about shelters, evacuation routes, and dangerous places.
Telecommunications
- Telecom companies use POI data to put cell towers and other essential things in the best places so everyone gets good coverage.
POI data also helps understand how people use their phones and how to improve their service in popular places.
How is POI Data Collected?
Collecting information about points of interest (POIs) can be done in several ways, each with advantages and challenges. Here are some standard methods:
Field Surveys: Traditional field surveys involve visiting locations to collect data. This method is highly accurate but also time-consuming and costly.
Web Scraping: Web scraping involves extracting data from websites. For example, Companies can collect POI data from online directories, review sites, and business websites. This method can quickly gather large amounts of data but requires advanced technical skills and may face legal and ethical challenges.
Satellite and Aerial Imagery: You can use Satellite and aerial imagery to identify POIs and their characteristics. This method helps map large areas and inaccessible regions, but it requires sophisticated technology and expertise to interpret the data accurately.
Crowdsourcing: Crowdsourcing involves gathering data from a large number of users. For example, many navigation apps allow users to report new or updated POIs. Although this method can provide real-time data and cover a wide area, the accuracy of the information may vary.
Government and Public Databases: Government agencies often maintain databases of public facilities such as schools, hospitals, and parks. These can be a reliable source of POI data. Accessing these databases might be restricted or require specific permissions.
Mobile Data and Sensors: Mobile devices and sensors in urban environments can collect POI data passively. For example, smartphone location data can reveal popular POIs based on user activity. However, this method raises privacy concerns as it involves collecting personal location data.
Where Can You Get POI Data?
A good database of points of interest (POI) must be updated to reflect changes in the real world. That includes opening new businesses, relocating or closing existing ones, expanding neighborhoods, and making new parking facilities available. The recent COVID-19 pandemic has also greatly impacted the physical world, causing many businesses to close. It would help if you documented these changes to keep our digital economy running smoothly, and POI databases provide this function.
But where do we find fresh, accurate, and reliable POI data? Many providers collect and update this data using various methods, ensuring the information is correct and current.
How to Choose the Right POI Data Vendor?
You should define your goals clearly when you want information about specific places. Next, figure out what exact information you need to achieve those goals. Then, consider your challenges and whether you can work with the information you want.
Quality and accuracy are essential for this kind of data, but there are other things to consider. For example, can the people providing the data give it to you in the way you need? How much work will you have to do to use the data? How do you choose the right company to get the data? Before you get this kind of data for your business, you should:
- Decide what your goals are and what challenges you might have
- Figure out what type of location information you need
- Decide how often you need the data to be updated (every day, every month, every year)
- Match the accuracy of the data with how you plan to use it (think about what might go wrong if the data is not precisely suitable for your needs)
When you are choosing the company to get the place-related data from, here are the main things to consider:
Coverage: Ensure the company has information about the places you are interested in. Do they have enough data for the area you want to look at? Do they have a lot of information about the kind of places you are interested in? Ask for the latest numbers and some example data from the areas you are interested in to ensure you will get enough data.
Accuracy: The data must be correct. You need to know how the company gets the data about the places and checks that it is accurate. You can make a set of data to compare with the information you get from the company. Do the latitude and longitude in the data from the company match the data you already have? Can you accept a small mistake in the data? You also need to see how the company decides what kind of place a place is and what other information it has about it.
Recentness: Some places change very infrequently, but others do. For example, many businesses shut down during the COVID-19 pandemic, and new ones will open as the economy improves. If the information about these places is old, it might be less helpful. Ask the company how often they update their data. When was the data last updated, and how usually do they do it?
Getting the Data and Checking it: The data you get depends greatly on how the company receives the information and keeps it up to date.
Usability: The information you get may be complex and challenging to work with. You might need to do more work to make it easier to use, and you may also need to spend money.
Getting the Information: Often, the company will give you the data using a unique way of sending it called an API. That means the data will be in one place that many applications can use. Sometimes, you can get the information all at once, which saves money because you don’t need to keep the data in various places; however, the second way means you can use the information in more different ways.
What Are the Challenges in POI Data Management?
While POI data offers numerous benefits, managing it comes with several challenges:
Accuracy and Quality
- Ensuring the data is correct is essential because wrong information can lead to bad decisions. The data can become old quickly, especially in fast-changing places.
- Checking with different sources or doing regular updates is necessary to keep the data sound.
Standardization
- POI data comes from different places, and each has its way of doing things. Making the data the same across all platforms is complex.
- If the data differs, it’s challenging to use in apps and services.
Privacy
- Getting POI data, especially from mobiles or crowds, raises privacy concerns. Individuals may want transparency about how their data is collected and used.
- Following rules like GDPR and respecting users’ privacy is essential.
Scalability
- As the amount of POI data gets bigger, handling it gets more complex. It’s a big problem for businesses with much real-time data.
- Cloud computing and big data technology can help but cost a lot.
Ethical Consideration
- Using POI data, especially for law or advertising, raises ethical questions. There’s a risk of using data to target people or invade privacy.
- Having clear rules for how to use POI data is essential to stop it from being used badly.
Duplicate Data
- POI data can get copied when many places report the same thing without fitting it together. That means there’s too much data, and it’s hard to use.
- Good ways of handling data, like getting rid of copies, are needed to solve this.
What Is the Future of POI Data?
The importance of POI data will grow because of technological improvements and increasing demand for location-based services. Here are some trends and prospects for POI data:
- Using AI and Machine Learning together: AI and machine learning are changing how POI data is collected, analyzed, and used. These technologies can help gather data automatically, improve accuracy, and find previously impossible insights. For example, machine learning can predict trends in POI data, like new popular places or changes in consumer behavior.
- Better Real-Time Data: The need for real-time POI data is growing, especially in transportation, emergency services, and retail areas. Future POI data systems will focus on providing the most recent information. Devices and sensors connected to the Internet will help improve the real-time abilities of POI data.
- More Kinds of POIs: As new types of POIs come up, like co-working spaces, electric vehicle charging stations, and temporary shops, the reach of POI data will keep growing. This growth will need ongoing updates to sorting systems and how data is collected.
- Making User Personalization Better: With improvements in data analytics, companies will increasingly use POI data to give personalized ideas to users. For example, navigation apps might suggest paths based on a user’s past likes or present feelings. Personalization will improve user experience, but you need more advanced data management to ensure privacy and usefulness.
- Smart Cities and Urban Mobility: POI data will be super important for managing urban movement and infrastructure in smart cities. This data will help improve traffic flow, public transport, and emergency response systems. Mixing POI data with innovative city plans will make urban environments more effective and sustainable.
- Global Standardization: Efforts to make POI data a standard globally will get stronger. It will make it easier to put together data from different places. Global standards will make sharing POI data between groups easier, leading to more work together and more complete data sets.
Final Thoughts
POI data is essential for many services and apps. It helps you find your way in a city and is also helpful for businesses. However, using this data has some challenges, such as making sure it’s accurate, keeping it private, and using it ethically.
As technology improves, we’ll find new and better ways to collect, manage, and use POI data. AI, machine learning, and IoT will make the data more accurate and valuable in real-time, allowing us to use it for even more incredible things.
Businesses, governments, and app developers must know how to use POI data effectively to stay competitive in our data-driven world. We’ll continue using this data in more parts of our lives, changing how we interact with the world.
