The effects of the crowdsourcing movement can be seen and felt across much of the World. Whether you’re are talking about businesses capitalizing on the sharing economy, such as Uber, Lyft, AirBnB, or Groupon, or individuals leveraging communities and technology to fight for social causes, like Open Ideo and Be My Eyes, crowdsourcing continues to have an increased impact on just about every aspect of modern day life. As a business owner or executive, you may be asking yourself “should my organization attempt to benefit from crowdsourcing”?
In this multi-part series, we will explore various aspects of crowdsourcing and how it could have impact on your organization. Today we will talk about what Ever Evolving Inc. calls the “Crowdsourcing Beneficiary Impact Model”. The first thing to understand about the Crowdsourcing Beneficiary Impact Model is profit motive of the product or service owner is not considered in the overall impact. This model looks at the pure benefit created for consumers by it’s implementation. There are 5 primary points used in this model that we plot using a radar chart.
- Time / Resource Utilization
- Customer Experience
- Impact & Exposure
- Knowledge / Information Share
- External Revenue / Profitability
Time / Resource Utilization
Think Uber and Lyft. For years, consumers had been stuck with a raw deal when it came to finding a ride. Normally people had to wait a considerable amount of time for a taxi and prior to its arrival the rider had no idea of the condition of the vehicle. Almost anyone over the age of 35 (sorry Millennials) has a horror story of waiting hours for a ride and when it arrived, stepping into the biggest steaming pile of a vehicle no one ever hoped to experience. Speaking of experience…
Customer Experience
Per their website, “Be My Eyes is a free mobile app designed to bring sight to the blind and visually impaired”. The app establishes a live video connection between blind and visually impaired users and sighted volunteers. “The app harnesses the power of generosity, technology and human connection to help blind and visually impaired individuals lead more independent lives”. That sounds like a truly great customer experience and can you imagine the impact this has in people’s lives!
Impact & Exposure
Not only can solutions that leverage aspects of crowdsourcing have considerable impact on lives, but it can help an organization gain considerable exposure. Groupon allows businesses to send out discounted offers to targeted members of the app’s considerable userbase. A relatively unknown or new business can reach tens if not hundreds of thousands of people in their target markets with a couple clicks and an inventive offer.
Knowledge / Information Share
How do we solve the worlds toughest problems? That is the question the makers of the app Open Ideo asked prior to the creation of their flagship platform. Their first thought was to bring in ideas from every corner of the globe and leverage the experience, expertise and knowledge of the worlds foremost experts in the arenas they were attempting to conquer. Giving everyone an opportunity to voice ideas, vote on the best ones, and allow experts to contribute to figuring out “the how” has given Open Ideo an opportunity to tackle some incredible initiatives.
External Revenue / Profitability
AirBnB allows owners of homes, condos, and townhouses to rent their residences similar to a hotel. Customers are able to schedule a day they would like to stay and AirBnB provides the interface to broker that type of a transaction. This allows home owners to increase rentability, gain access to clients that they may not have been able to market, and increase their overall profitability.
Conclusion
Join us for Part 2 of our Crowdsourcing Innovation series where we take our experience, research, and lessons learned at events like Crowdsourcing Week Global 2019 and showcase how organizations can leverage the Crowdsourcing Beneficiary Impact Model to determine what type of system makes the most sense for their company.