White Paper |

Crowd Sourcing

CROWD SOURCING
A Platform for Open Innovation
Role Of Crowd Sourcing in Todays Business
Applications Of Crowd Sourcing
Crowd Sourcing Process

White Paper |

Crowd Sourcing

Abstract

With
the
digital
era,
businesses are growing at a
faster
pace
and
the
organizations need to bring
in innovation, pool in
innovative
ideas
and
develop new products at a
shorter span of time. The
mantra to make all these
possible
is
through
crowdsourcing
allowing
your end-customers and
other stakeholders to pool
in their ideas thereby
bringing about a change
without spending much
time and cost. According to
Massolutions
research
group, the global crowd
sourcing is growing at a

faster pace with the venture

capitalists investing upto
$300 million dollars in it.
To adopt Crowdsourcing
technologies organizations
need
to
adopt
the
following
Crowd Sourcing should be
used where Larger task
has to be broken down
into smaller set of tasks.
It should be used where
the User need not require
any
domain
specific
knowledge.
Organizations must make
use of crowdsourcing for
tasks which require few
minutes to complete.

Page 2

White Paper |

Crowd Sourcing

Role of Crowd Sourcing in Todays

Business
Crowd Sourcing has become
an integral part of todays
business allowing customers
to participate in the development of new products and
services. The traditional approach involved the ideas of
people internal to the organization resulting in a product
that involved low differentiation, undergoing a series of
changes post launch and being unsatisfactory to custom-

ers. But now, with the evolution of digital technologies

such as social media, mobility
the organizations are able to
tap into the knowledge of the
crowd improving their innovation. This enables the product manufacturers and designers to make better and
informed
decisions
on
launching a new product/
service with differentiating
features.

Applications of Crowd Sourcing

Tasks that involve repetitive
work like data collection/data
entry jobs can be performed
using crowdsourcing. Some
of the applications of Crowd
Sourcing are:
# 1: Data Collection: For Extracting, analyzing and verifying data for launching a new
product/solving an existing
problem in an organization.
Crowdsourcing will help in
pooling in more information
as each individual will obtain
the data from their personal-

ized networks resulting in a

vast collection of ideas/ feedbacks.
#2: Categorize data: To avoid
data clutters it is needed to
organize the data entries.
These tasks can be performed by a group of individuals at a faster pace allowing
the Organization to save time
and cost.
#3: Sentiment Tracking: The
crowd can be used to track
and analyze the public sentiments on a particular topic.

Crowd Sourcing Process

Organizations that are new to
Crowd Sourcing should adopt

the following five steps for

the ease of implementation

Page 3

White Paper |

Crowd Sourcing

Identify the Problem to resolve

through
Crowdsourcing

Broadcast the
Problem online

Listen to the
crowd solutions

Step1: The organization needs to

understand the problem that
has to be resolved through
crowd sourcing. After which, the
matching crowd sourcing opportunities have to be identified. It
then needs to prioritize the
problems.
Step2: The organizations have to
tap the way in which work is performed today. Nowadays most
of the people utilize
smartphones/tablets to do their
tasks and utilize social media
websites to engage with others.
So, the best way to crowd source
is to put the problem in social
media websites and other online

Analyze the
solutions with
other internal
stakeholders

Award the winning solutions

sites and the companys web

platform so that customers can
identify with it.
Step3:The next step is to listen
to the workers solutions on the
given problem .The workers performance have to be monitored
from time-to-time and the organizations can fine-tune them
further. The organization can also encourage customers to give
their suggestions/ideas in the
web portal.
Step4 & 5:Finally, the solutions
are analyzed by the management and the winning solutions
are awarded for their
crowdsourcing contributions.

Different forms of Crowd Sourcing

Crowd sourcing has five different forms that includes a
sourcer/manager and a market/
group of people. Identifying the
right type of crowd sourcing
methodology helps to manage

even if it is a large job involving

thousands of workers or just a
small task with few workers. The
task can be either supervised by
the manager or let open to the
group to manage by themselves

Page 4

White Paper |

Crowd Sourcing

#1 Crowd Engagement : Crowd

Engagement can be used to
identify the best solution for
performing the task by conducting contests ,so that the cost for
the company is reduced to just
that particular person who provides the best solution while attaining a pool of ideas .
#2 Macro Tasks: To attain specific skills for a particular task or
a project. The worker is hired
from the crowd for performing
that task and is paid on a per
task basis.
#3 Micro Tasks: It refers to large

repetitive tasks. These tasks are

divided into smaller chunks and
divided among the workforce.
Finally the tasks are unified to
attain a meaningful output.
#4 Crowd Funding: It involves
utilizing social media sites to
raise money. Putting videos or
creating messages in online sites
to raise money from the public.
#5 Self-Managed Crowds: A
problem/challenge is posted by
the organization on the social
media and other online sites.
The crowd forms groups and the
group with the winning solution
is awarded.

Benefits of Crowd Sourcing

Nurture a culture of Innovation within the organization.
To gain a 3600 view of customer sentiments.
To increase the customer
satisfaction by introducing
new features in the existing

product/services.
To increase the success rate
on launching of new products.
Improve customer engagement by getting their opinions/suggestions also in the
launching of new products.

Page 5

White Paper |

Crowd Sourcing

Conclusion
Crowd Sourcing thereby remains the optimal solution to many of todays business challenges at one
end it generates an innovation based culture into
the organization while at the other end it helps organizations to save costs. When implemented with
care, it can garner benefits to the organization by
improving the productivity and customer engagement.

Author
Roshni is a part of Digital Consulting Team at Sensiple . She
consults organizations on embarking their digital
strategies .Roshni has completed her Engineering in
Electronics and Instrumentation and is a management
graduate from NIT Trichy. Her interests include advanced
analytics that helps to save time and optimize costs.
Roshni
Digital Consultant, SENSIPLE

Page 6

@2015 SENSIPLE Software Solutions, Chennai, India. SENSIPLE

believes that the information in this publication is accurate as of
its publication date; such information is subject to change
without prior notice. SENSIPLE acknowledges the proprietary
rights of the trademarks and products names of other
companies mentioned in this document.
SENSIPLE is a premier IT solution provider headquartered in the
United States and with delivery centers in India, SENSIPLE has
extended its services across the globe. SENSIPLE has evolved
from being a business consulting company in its early stages to
a one stop IT solution provider over the years. Its service lines
are Customer Experience, Digital Enterprise, Enterprise
Applications, Testing and Infrastructure Services with clients
across the globe.

CORPORATE OFFICE

OMAHA OFFICE

1000 Route 9 North, Suite 303 Woodbridge, NJ 07095

Phone : 732 283 0801
Fax
: 732 283 0489, 732 283 3775

13011 Scott St, Omaha, NE 68142

Phone : 402 505 7790
Fax
: 402 505 7798

OFFSHORE OFFICE

SINGAPORE

Plot No: 9/A15, SIPCOT IT Park Padur Post

Siruseri, Tamilnadu 603 103 India
Phone : +91 44 4741 9000
Fax
: +91 44 4741 9100

662, Woodlands Ring Road

#5-226 Singapore 730 662
Phone : 65 6279 1053