Crowdsourcing for Product ManagersPaul Dombowsky

Opening Thought

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…the world is becoming too fast, too complex and too networked for any organization to have all the answers inside.

• Yochai Benkler, Yale University from the Wealth of Networks

• Product Management Defined – What is it in a Web2.0 World? • Does customer engagement help?• Current conversations – participant or observer• What is crowdsourcing?• Is crowdsourcing a viable option?• Risks and rewards for crowdsourcing• Can crowdsourcing help build better products?• Can crowdsourcing help accelerate path to profits?• Examples• Best Practices• Tools• Q&A

Key Topics

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The organizational structure within a business that manages the development, marketing and sale of a product or set of products throughout the product life cycle. It encompasses the broad set of activities required to get the product to market and to support it thereafter.

In 2011, is this definition enough?

What is Product Management?

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The opening up of innovation to internal and external input for the development of products in various stages of the product development lifecycle.

Crowdsourcing can be part of an open innovation or social product management strategy.

What is Social Product Management?

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Product Management Lifecycle

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Vision/Need

Define Customer

Define Product

Develop Product

Test Product

Deliver Product

Refine Product

Crowdsource Option: features & functionality

Capture new customers with options & features they are looking for.

Crowdsource Testing – early adopters reward

Socializing requirements and prioritization gathering improves decision making

According to Forrester Research (2010),71% of people say they trust the opinionsof family, friends and colleagues as a sourceof information on products and services.

Their crowd or tribe.

Where does trust sit?

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Where the conversations are happening?

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Official & Unofficial• Google Groups• Wiki’s• User Groups• Podcasts• Blogs• User Voice• Epinions• Cnet• Reviewsarena• Buzzillions• Tribe Smart

Why not tap into the conversations that are already happening?

Get the crowd working for you.

How Product Development Used to Happen

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Product Development w/ Open Innovation

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Sources of Innovation

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Sources of Innovation

Internal R&D

Customers

Experts

PartnersSuppliers

Prospects

Other internal

team members

Does participation require a reward?

Do people contribute for the good of the brands they like?

How do you democratize the input?

Engagement – Who Participates?

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Millennials (born ’91 and after)

Gen Y (born ’81-’91)

Gen X (born ’65-’80)

Boomers (born ’46-’64)

Civics (born ’45 or earlier)

DefinedCrowdsourcing is an engagement process whereby organizations seek input from either open or closed communities of people, either homogenous or not, to contribute ideas, solutions, or support in an open process whereby the elements of creativity, competition and campaigning are reinforced through social media to come up with more powerful ideas or solutions than could be obtained through other means.

Why Bother?Organizations have a difficult time engaging with their communities to strengthen their relationship and be citizen focused. Internal or external, the community has ideas that can be harnessed that come from diverse backgrounds, experiences and education.

What is Crowdsourcing?

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InternalExperts

Emergent Experts(online community leaders,

product advocates)

Customers &Prospects

Who is your crowd?

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EngagementTargets

Strong brands foster active crowds• Element of trust• It only takes one disingenuous campaign to cause

problems for you• Transparency fosters participation• Social media footprint does matter• Prospects may have bought into your brand but not

your products yet – how are you keeping them engaged?

Does your brand matter?

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The Appeal

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• Crowdsourcing surfaces new perspectives• Invites participation from nontraditional

sources • Infuses real energy into the process of generating ideas • Empowers people when they feel their voice is being heard• Technology can enable participation by disenfranchised

(ie. PCs in libraries/shelters with citizen engagement campaigns)

• Builds engagement and relationships with new audiences

Crowdsourcing Pros and Cons

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PROS• Reduced time to market

• Reduced risk due to early customer input

• Increased customer lifecycle value

• Broader source of innovation

• Strengthened brand through participation

• Organizations can’t have all the brightest people on staff

• Ideas don’t have to be discovered by internal R&D teams to be capitalized upon

• Benefits from varied experiences

CONS• Less control

• Needed trust not easily come by in some organizations

• Requires community management

• Suffers if crowd is too narrow

• Disruptive to traditional timelines for product roll outs

• First attempt is risky until you understand your crowd

• Need to know your target audience

IdeaStorm was created to give a direct voice to Dell’s customers and an avenue to have online “brainstorm” sessions to allow them to share ideas and collaborate with one another and Dell. Their goal through IdeaStorm is to hear what new products or services you’d like to see Dell develop.

In almost three years, IdeaStorm has crossed the 10,000 idea mark and implemented nearly 400 ideas!

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Example 1: Innovation from the Crowd

Quirky is an all in one product development shop for inventors.

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Example 2: Product Development from the Crowd

Threadless runs regular campaigns to select designs that are then produced and sold to a ready-made market that participated in the product selection.

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Example 3: Product Selection by the Crowd

Best Practices

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• Have a clear strategy for using crowdsourcing• IP Ownership• Competitive visibility

• Break things down so crowd is clear what you are looking for• Build trust

• Be open in your communications about the crowd’s role in the process

• Do what you say you are going to do• ABEYC – always be expanding your crowd

• The crowd needs to be big enough – but not too big• ABRYC – always be refining your crowd

• Creating diversity is as important as creating size

Build a Social Product Strategy

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• Reach customers & prospects where they live – join in the conversations that are happening already

• Capitalize on valuable customer and prospect insight• Develop a culture of collaboration• Implement the right social technology to get the job done• Communicate results and intentions and be open as

possible• Let conversations happen in the open• Be crowd friendly on an ongoing basis

• Easy to set-up and deploy• Able to run multiple campaigns at once• Can run Crowdsourcing and Crowdfunding Campaigns• Build stickiness and community around those that engage

(sign-in and see past votes, comments, ideas)• Hosted solution (in Canada)• Able to be implemented on existing website or set-up in new,

destination site• Social Media connected• One of few sub $1000/month solutions

Ideavibes Crowd Engagement Platform

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How Does Ideavibes Compare?

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• Enterprise Collaboration or Idea Management– Large – multi-functioning platforms for Idea Management– Integrated into change management and process improvement

lifecycles– Chaordix, Bright Idea, etc.

• Middle-tier Focused Crowdsourcing Apps– Purpose-built customizable apps focused on crowdsourcing– Narrow or wide focus– Multiple crowdsourcing and crowdfunding campaigns– Ideavibes, Spigit– Note – Ideavibes is only white label crowdfunding platform available

• Ad-hoc website or Social Media widgets– Developed by web teams with basic functionality– Functionality as opposed to business process driven

Questions?

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• Use the GoTo Meeting Q&A section on the right.

Resources

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• The Wisdom of Crowds – James Surowiecki • Crowdsourcing – Jeff Howe• Crowdsourcing.org• Crowdsortium.org• The Daily Crowdsource

• Presentation will be on Slideshare by end of day today.

Thank youPaul Dombowsky | 613.878.1681 | paul@ideavibes.com

www.ideavibes.com