Searching for New Ideas with Crowdsourcing

The existing communication technologies, internet sites and online questioning give the modern companies a possibility to use not only traditional research methods, but also comparatively new and original ways of finding new ideas like, for example, crowdsourcing. This method is a key to many solutions – from finding the name for their new products to designing their look and features.

Crowdsourcing can be defined as the transfer of tasks, traditionally performed by the company’s employees, to a large group of people through an open call. The term was first used in 2006 in the article “The Rise of Crowdsourcing” by Jeff Howe. The author has differentiated four types of crowdsourcing strategies: crowdfunding, crowdvoting, crowdcreation and crowd wisdom. These strategies give the companies a possibility to find new ideas and solve their tasks very quickly and cheap. They provide the access to new talents outside the organization and assist in creating new competitive advantages (new products, technologies or product features). Web-based crowdsourcing is especially popular and convenient both for the companies and for people, who can easily leave their answers and suggestions or express their opinions on the company’s product range. If we search for the corporations that make use of the crowdsourcing strategies we can mention Cisco Systems, General Electric (organized a multi-million dollar challenge to find breakthrough ideas to create cleaner, more efficient and economically viable grid technologies), L’Oreal (used crowdsourcing to find fresh advertising ideas), Pepsi (used the method to create the design of a Pepsi can), Nike, Microsoft and many others.