Social media provides businesses with an array of mediums they can use to communicate with consumers. Many of these medium are largely used as conduits for business to convey information to consumers rather than the other way around. Now this one way conduit can provide consumers will valuable information and appealing deals, but it fails to truly engage consumers. Businesses often time fail to remember or even acknowledge that engaging consumers can reveal new ideas and creative expressions that never would have been realized otherwise.
Crowd sourcing usually begins with companies directly reaching out to customers via their websites or social media sites. Companies looking for ways to increase their customer satisfaction through service improvements, or product modifications and creations have found crowd sourcing to be especially useful. The extremely popular coffee chain Starbucks is a avid user of crowd. They have a tab on their page that allows consumers to post various ideas. Community users in turn are allowed to vote on these ideas, which in turn helps Starbucks sift through the suggestions.
In addition to receiving product and business operation suggestions, consumers can be engaged in an even more direct manner through which they design new products objects for specific companies. As of last week, Mark Cuban, the billionaire owner of the Dallas Mavericks asked fans to design new uniforms for his team and upload them o his blog. He will in turn review the submissions and possibly choice one of them to be the team's future uniform. Known for being very sharp, Mark Cuban has posted on many sites, including his blog, that the Dallas Mavericks automatically receive rights to every design submitted. So, when devising a crowd sourcing project, think about what legal implications the contest might have
Maverick's Owner Mark Cuban
As you look at your company's social media presence, consider the ways in which crowd sourcing could help your company.
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