Foursquare has begun the roll out of new service, Local Updates, designed to help merchants reach nearby customers with timely text and photo messages.

The service will be offered to the nearly one million merchants who have claimed their businesses on Foursquare, and is in its simplest state a status update option for business owners.

With the service, merchants will be able to communicate with customers for the first time within Foursquare.

The geo-location check-in and recommendation mobile app will choose which users are offered messages based on its algorithms.

This considers the check-in frequency and geographic location of a user, as well as the type of businesses they have previously praised.

The updates are shown in the Friends tab of the app.