CorpComms Magazine

Everybody's doing it. Burger chains, confectioners, politicians, satirists and humanitarian organisations are just a few of those using the 'crowdsourcing' phenomenon to improve their communications and marketing plans.

Crowdsourcing involves cutting out the middle man: a direct form of market research and product development, rather than just sterile databases taken from the electoral register or phone book. The customer or target audience provides the data and ideas for improving the product or service and the messages that are used to promote it. For example, the communicator asks people to answer questions about a new product launch, and then keeps them on a database for further market testing. Market research is outsourced to the masses.

The rise of social media, such as Facebook and Twitter, has driven the phenomenon. The ease of communication between chocolate bar makers and broadband providers and their consumers means that people can be easily organised and incentivised to help out the brands they love.

The build-up to the recent general election finally brought crowdsourcing as a marketing concept into the mainstream: David Cameron asked the public to help the Tories attack Labour's final Budget. Buttressing his inclusive, modern man image, Cameron declared: 'We know the form by now with Labour's Budgets. There is a whole load of giveaways upfront while all the nasty stuff is stashed away in the small print. We want people to log on, have a look, pick out the misleading bits and help us hold Labour to account.'

No longer would Cameron just rely on the judgments of professional politicians and economists. The people whose votes he was so desperate to snaffle could help develop and therefore support policy.

Crowdsourcing is a powerful concept, but it is not without pitfalls. Communicators must fully understand the role of crowdsourcing before using the idea as part of their  marketing plans. Broadly, there are two types of  rowdsourcing. The first is essentially data gathering; the second, more exciting version, is often referred to as 'co-creation' - that is bringing in consumers to actually come up with ideas.

Missing data

Data gathering is straightforward. People are simply asked for their judgements or views, essentially becoming a focus group. So, an online bank can ask its customer throughout the logging on process whether its service has been acceptable and what can be improved.

Gareth Horton is insight director at Market Location, which holds data, including 2.3 million business records, which it sells on to marketers. In many ways a traditional market research business, the company has nevertheless started using some crowdsourced data. However, Horton is sceptical of how up-todate and accurate the information can be. He worries that crowdsourcing leaves companies open to receiving prank or fantasist information, which is no basis on which to make marketing decisions, particularly given the faceless nature of answering questions online.

'Is that person really that person? When was the information last updated?' Horton asks, pointing out that there may be little incentive for people to keep adding key demographic changes to their lives, such as job changes and geographic moves.

He thinks that crowdsourcing has been more effective in situations where the stakes were high, where pranks would be kept to a minimum. When Haiti was devastated by an earthquake in January, for example, Oxfam used an audio blog site and Catholic Relief Services Skype to gather information from residents on where problems such as looting and trapped victims were located.

Another marketing services provider, Callcredit Information Group, thinks that there are ways around the information accuracy problem. Paul Kennedy, head of consulting at Callcredit, says that incentives are vital. The group has an online consumer panel, slightly bizarrely named 'Cameo with Attitude' that offers a reward of a regular prize draw for providing personal information and views on products and trends. The data is aggregated and panellists regularly contacted by a compliance team to freshen up their personal information. 'These sort of consumer panels have been around for a long time,' says Kennedy. 'But because of the rise of social media, some organisations have realised that there is a greater role for this type of research.'

Virgin Media provides a more qualitative carrot. At various stages of its services, be that the moment of purchasing a digital television or installing broadband, customers are asked to make a quick judgment out of ten on how satisfied they are with the group. Virgin believes that, as this takes only a few seconds, people are happier to either sound off or express gratitude if they are particularly disappointed or happy. The company judges its work by taking the average of the number of 'advocates', or those rating a service at between eight and ten, against those marking at five or lower.

The exciting bit

What Virgin then does with these customers is a good example of how crowdsourcing has developed into co-creation. The advocates are asked to join an online community called 'The Sofa'. They are approached to trial products, meaning that they are incentivised by being the first in the country to experience new technology such as high-speed broadband. There is a forum for them to then comment and offer their opinions to Virgin technicians.

'We launched 50mg broadband trials in Kent,' explains Gareth Mead, head of corporate media relations. 'The first people to try it in the area were from The Sofa. As a result of being able to try the services before others, these people feel that they are part of a community.'

At the moment, Virgin is looking to tailor the demands on bandwidth in family households, so is testing products where a mum is watching iPlayer, dad is checking out football websites and the child is online gaming. The results will be used to improve the performance of its high-speed connections. The advantage is that Virgin had an existing base willing to help out the group.

Daljit Bhurji, managing director at Diffusion PR, points to the error made by sweet brand Skittles last year. The website was relaunched with a live Twitter feed, bringing it very much into the 21st century and meaning that positive information - people's opinions of the sweets - could be seen immediately.

So, any mention of Skittles on Twitter would go on to the website. With an existing fanbase, it could reasonably be expected that a number of excited customers would praise the brand so that the website would provoke positive images.

Compounding the mistake with no filter control, social media users had a field day mocking Skittles and seeing those derogatory comments pop up on the website. They were having a good laugh at Skittles itself,' says Bhurji. You need to make sure that there is a pre-existing community of some form. Starting from scratch - jumping two steps ahead [to a full crowdsourcing site] - is when you see lacklustre campaigns.'

More effective, argues Bhurji, is Walkers Crisps' 'Flavour Cup'. Supported by a television campaign, there was an incentive not to come up with daft flavours, as the winner was awarded £50,000 plus one per cent of profits. Last year, tasty but unusual flavours emerged, such as onion bhaji and Cajun-flavoured squirrel.

Jim Hawker, co-founder of London-based agency Threepipe, is doing something similar for client Gourmet Burger Kitchen. On the group's website, customers are given the opportunity to come up with a new burger for the winter menu. Hawker claims that the site has got 'literally thousands of hits' in its first few months and a Facebook group as been set up to support the campaign.

As customers can support or criticise the burgers in the shortlist that the company will draw up, it is likely that sales of the chosen culinary delight will be strong. 'This takes the risk out of product launches, as you know that the demand is out there,' he says. Candace Kuss, lead counsel for planning and interactive strategy at communications group Hill & Knowlton, is a veteran of crowdsourcing campaigns. She was a volunteer on Howard Dean's US presidency bid in 2003. Although Dean failed, his online campaign was hugely celebrated and became the template for Barack Obama's success in the following general election.

Dean's supporters, not just his official campaign team, were making short videos to help organise groups in small areas to get the vote out. 'The digital tools that are now available to people have allowed them to do things like video spots to a professional level,' she explains. 'There was a very big contest to produce a [President George W] Bush spot in 30 seconds. They were very polished, anti-Bush spots.' And they became a way for the Democrats to campaign against the Republican president.

Doritos, the tortilla chip snack brand, has aped the idea by running an annual competition for people to create the advertisement for its big money Superbowl spot. The rewards are millions of dollars and bragging rights - a record 116 million people tuned in for this year's advertisement. 'Doritos has done a great job,' grins Kuss. 'They've said Show us what you can do.'

And that really is the co-creation that marketers can use to make their products and services the leading players in their markets.

Cool views

Levi Strauss, which produced the world's first pair of jeans in 1873, is asking its American customers to come up with innovative air-drying solutions as part of its 'Care tag for our planet' campaign that is designed to reduce the environmental impact of its products once they leave its stores.

The company, which operates in 110 countries, is working with online crowdsourcing platform Myoo Create as it seeks ideas to create the next generation of clotheslines.

This follows a third party lifecycle assessment on a pair of Levi's 501 jeans which revealed that, on average, almost 60 per cent of the climate impact comes during the consumer phase.

Nearly 80 per cent of that impact is a direct result of the energy intensive methods that consumers use for drying. More than nine out of ten American households have tumble dryers, while some communities have even banned clotheslines deeming them unsightly.

Within a day of launching the competition, Levi Strauss had received suggestions for a Solar Clothes Drying Dome, comprising a recycled aluminium mesh with a black top affixed to a mounting pole, which is installed in the ground, and Nature's Dryer, a clothesline designed to look like a tree from whose branches laundry is hung.

Michael Kobori, vice president for social and environmental sustainability at Levi Strauss, said: 'When we think about machines that use a lot of energy, cars and air conditioners quickly come to mind. It's easy to overlook something as simple as a clothes dryer. With this contest, we are looking for pioneering designs that will help future generations think differently about air drying.'

The competition, which runs for two months until 31 July, offers prizes totalling $10,000. Its tag line says: 'Nobody is as smart as everybody, which is why we need you to help solve these challenges.'

An InnoCentive challenge

InnoCentive is a self-styled 'global innovation website' that acts as a global brainstorm for the world's thorniest problems. Launched by pharmaceutical giant Eli Whitney, its online community of more than 200,000 Solvers, which include scientists, engineers, business people and academics, have previously cracked problems such as extending the shelf life of microbiological products and passenger screening for contagious agents.

Other achievements include a compound for skin tanning, a method to prevent crisps breaking and a miniextruder in brickmaking.

When Colgate Palmolive needed a more efficient method for getting its toothpaste into the tube, its internal research and development team were unable to provide a viable solution.

The dental care-to-pet food group company posted the problem on the InnoCentive site. Canadian engineer, Ed Melcarek, proposed putting a positive charge on fluoride powder and then grounding the tube. Melcarek was paid $25,000 for his idea.

Other global companies, such as plane maker Boeing, chemicals giant DuPont, manufacturer Procter & Gamble and pharmaceuticals group Novartis, pay a membership fee of $80,000 to use InnoCentive's Solvers, offering prizes ranging between $10,000 and $25,000.

Their use of such crowdsourcing technology reflects the inability of mature companies to keep up with the speed of innovation and the demands for growth placed on them by investors. It has been estimated that an annual organic growth rate of six per cent for Procter & Gamble would require building a brand new $4 billion business every year.

On 30 April, InnoCentive launched the Emergency Situation Challenge, asking 'Solvers' to identify and describe a solution to help prevent further damage caused by the BP oil spill. Almost 2,000 responses have since been lodged.

InnoCentive has a track record in solving oilrelated problems. An Illinois based chemist, John Davis, recognised that concrete will not set before it is needed if it is kept vibrating. It still pours like liquid. Applying this knowledge, he realised that concrete vibrating devices can be adapted to keep oil in Alaskan storage tanks from freezing. He was paid $20,000 by the Oil Spill Recovery Institute of Cordova in Alaska for the idea.

A slick operation

Volunteers, government officials and the media have joined forces to collect and share images and information on the damage caused to local communities and wildlife in the aftermath of the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

The most recent innovation, the Oil Reporter application for iPhone and Android phones, allows people to log reports, take geotagged photographs and record video regarding the impact of the spill.

The Oil Reporter app asks users: What do you see? They then describe the thickness and texture of visible oil, wildlife in the locality and the impact to surrounding wetlands.

Data collected via the mobile applications will be managed by San Diego State University's Visualisation Centre, and made available to response organisations requiring assistance.

The Deepwater Horizon spill has spawned more than oil. Across the Gulf of Mexico, collaborations using Web 2.0 tools are emerging. Oilspill.labucketbrigade.org, which has been launched by New Orleans based not-forprofit environmental group Louisiana Bucket Brigade, features a user-generated oil spill crisis map. The site collects and maps witnesses' texts, tweets and email messages about the impact of the spill, which must be accompanied by location information, such as postcodes or map co-ordinates.

Reports include: 'Smells like citrus aerosol coming from wind blowing north east', 'dolphin in water off Grand Isle State Park swimming in water with oil' and 'white sand of Pensacola Beach is now salt and pepper'.

Anne Rolfes, the Brigade's founding director, said: 'The Oil Spill Crisis Map compiles and maps eyewitness accounts of the oil's effects in real time. This is a tool for all of us to understand the extent of the damage.'

BP and several government agencies, including the US Coastguard, host DeepwaterHorizonResponse.com which provides phone numbers for people to report spill related damage to wildlife, the coastline and property. Visitors are also asked to suggest ways in which the spill can be stopped.

The site also has links to associated Facebook, Twitter, Flickr and YouTube pages. Indeed, its Facebook page has more than 30,000 followers who regularly update the site with information. Questions or complaints often solicit responses from the site's administrators. When Facebook user Karen Landers left a comment that she had heard tar balls were arriving at the coastline, officials responded: '@Karen, correct. Some tar balls were found on the Dauphen Island yesterday,' adding a link to a story about the discovery. When a BP representative allegedly said Louisiana isn't the only place that has shrimp, his phone number and email address were posted on the Facebook site by a user.

Two students from MIT have launched Grassroots Mapping, which invites local residents and 'activist mappers' to document the oil spill by sending inexpensive cameras into the air in helium balloons and kites to take aerial photos from up to 1,500 feet. Founder Jeffrey Warren said: 'If we do it now, it's a relatively low cost, and it's a time commitment, but if we get out and begin mapping, we'll have that data at a later date - when we wish we had it, perhaps.'

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