Economics
Crowdsourcing is an increasingly important business concept. Crowdsourcing brings together crowds of previously disconnected people allowing the social community to
get involved in the development process for a business. With the internet reaching saturation in the US and mobile internet being ever present wherever we go, the
power of the crowd is becoming highly relevant to industries.
One of the most popular crowd sourcing definitions is from Jeff Howe who described crowdsourcing as “the act of a company or institution taking a function once
performed by employees and outsourcing it to an undefined (and generally large) network of people in the form of an open call.”
For example in in 2011, Volkswagen’s Canadian division ran a campaign that asked its Facebook fans to help choose the script, cast and music for the third chapter of
its ‘Drive Until’ ad series.
In 2012 Levi was creating an ad campaign target to 18 to 34 year olds. They ran a crowdsourcing campaign using Instagram asking people to upload pictures of themselves
wearing Levi’s. The individuals they selected were utilized in this campaign. Here is a link to one of the Let’s Go Forth ads: https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=uvqUIkbDyKc
Lay’s used crowdsourcing to select their most recent potato chips
In your posting discuss advantages to companies / individuals of crowdsourcing; challenges associated with this; have you done this or would you consider doing this
and provide examples for your responses.