Crowdsourcing is to 2009 as Twitter was to 2008. It was the sparkly object that many assumed was the second coming.

I’m a little sick of it, to be honest.

Don’t get me wrong – I’m all for innovation. But I’m not for innovation without strategy, without a vision that goes past the next few month. Crowdsourcing is the fool’s gold of internet business models.

This ire has been building, but is partially due to reading Rick Liebling’s new e-book Everyone Is Illuminated. Rick has been doing some brave thinking about crowdsourcing and I applaud his effort with this e-book. It’s other experts I take issue with.

Which experts am I talking about? The ones who claim that crowdsourcing will replace agencies. Those who think you get better ideas from the crowd than individuals who study this process everyday. If that’s you – you’re in my sights.

This is all to support Rick’s point that crowdsourcing is a means, but not as an end in itself. That gem of an insight is a hard truth proven by what has worked…and what hasn’t worked.

What Could Work?

As far as I can tell, there are two things that crowdsourcing does correctly, which Wil Merritt, CEO of Zooppa describes on slide 30:

1. High levels of consumer brand engagement
2. Insights that brand communications generate

Well, that’s true if everyone keeps participating. Sweepstakes have a long history of success, but those usually require 10 seconds of thought – not the hours required for most advertising/marketing efforts. For every winner, you produce thousands of losers who just wasted their time. Not exactly inspiring.

(These two benefits are likely preaching to the choir and the insights are from a small vocal minority, but whatever…)

But OK, let’s assume these are true. I will give you those two points. Now let’s look at what crowdsourcing doesn’t do.

What Definitely DOESN’T Work

It may have been said before, but let’s review what crowdsourcing definitely can’t do for you:

• Brand strategy – The insight and planning that lead to long-term success.
• Integrated campaigns – Want your campaign to work across print, TV, and web?
• Production - For all the hype about things being easier to produce these days (and they are), can your crowdsourced winner write, design, and use motion tools? Doubtful.
• Measurement – Who is pulling your data and analyzing it? Not the crowd.

These are just a few…”pain points.” But it’s a tough reality for the most optimistic of a very idealistic people. Idealistic to a fault, in my opinion. Take this quote from Zooppas’ Merritt again:

“Today CMOs like to claim that the true owners of their brands are customers [True]. If they truly believe this what could be better than to allow customers to create their own messaging about the brands they own and love, and to enable them to share enthusiastically these messages with their friends and family.”

OK, there are two things here.

For one, no one’s trying to stop anyone from sharing messages. In fact, social media strategy is all about getting others to share your message. That’s not revolutionary.

Secondly, what kind of logic is this? I believe my teeth to be my own; that doesn’t mean I should give myself a root canal! I’ll leave that to the experts.

WHY Won’t This Work

Should agencies be concerned the crowd will steal their jobs? In short: no.

• The Work (Usually) Sucks: Rick is totally correct when he says, “I don’t think crowdsourcing creative content is going to raise the value, and therefore fees, of creative work.” Doritos might get lucky once, but after that commercial airs, so what?
• The “Pay” Sucks: John Winsor, CEO Victors & Spoils, had this to say about a crowdsourcing price model: “Get more, pay less” (slide 6). That’s more of your work, while paying less money to you. Sound awesome, right?
• The “Side Pay” Sucks: Rick points out that this is more of a zero-sum game – like Highlander, there can be only one (winner). It’s not like the World Series of Poker where pros eliminated early could make money off other marks.
• The Lack of Perspective Sucks: Evan Fry, also of Victors & Spoils, tells the story of Steve Jobs’ horrendous iMac name which a long-term agency partner was able to dissuade him from using (slide 20). You don’t get that brand strategy perspective from the crowd.
• The Brand Guidance Sucks: Spike Jones speaks some truth (slide 24):

“So you REALLY want to base your entire brand…on creative that is pinned to a two-sentence description of what you’re looking for? By a bunch of people that want to make a quick buck?…Now do you really think that you are going to get anything of value?”

Means, Not Ends

All due respect to Rick, but I think he buries the lead in this ebook (as have I…duly noted). The real key insight here – and I haven’t heard this from others – is that crowdsourcing is a tactic, but not a viable business model.

Rick states it succinctly (slide 44): “But I fear that many brands are using crowdsourcing not as a means, but as the ends.”

That’s the key idea. Sure, get the crowd involved; solicit their opinions. That will provide the engagement and insight.

But handing over the keys to your brand and letting the crowd control it? No way.

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(Image courtesy of James Cridland via Flickr)

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I considered requiring you to subscribe to my enewsletter to download the white paper. After all, if you were interested in this subject, it’s a sure bet you will be interested in my other content.

However, I’ve decided that this requirement does not fit well with my overall strategy or the community environment found in a Web 2.0 world.

Rather, I would just ask that you consider subscribing via email or RSS. Thanks!

The winner: Threadless

Threadless is an online t-shirt manufacturer based in meat-space in my new home, sweet Chicago. They also possess an undeniable cool factor and loads of fun-ness. Here are some reasons why you should sign up for their newsletter:

• Threadless’ business model is based on a Web 2.0 mindset. They have a constant open call for t-shirt designs which are then voted on by the community. The top vote-getters are made into shirts and sold online (and a recently opened retail store). Plus, they’ve thought through the process from the buyer’s POV: even if a shirt is sold out, you can vote for it to be re-made and notified when it is.
• Because new design are always being voted on and shirts made, Threadless boasts a constantly changing inventory. That means the eNewsletter is always fresh and innovative.
• They offer incentives to draw the best designers for their business. Winners make money if their design is chosen. This avoids a slew of “Don’t tase me, bro!” knock-offs.
• Simply put, Threadless gives props. The eNewsletter starts (after a helpful index) with that week’s winner (image #1), followed quickly with the four new shirts being printed that week (image #2). This puts the best material above the fold, and creates buzz machines of the featured designers. Plus, it further stimulates the community. Everyone loves feeling like they voted for a winner.
• Threadless uses what they’ve got. They turn designs into art and advertise it in the eNewsletter. They get corporations and bands to sponsor shirts (i.e. “Iron & Wine <3s Threadless”). They podcast about, you guessed it, t-shirts and cool stuff.
• Recently, they have been adding local elements. Image #3 shows a recent art show they held in their retail store. This gets (possibly new) groups of buyers in their store, gives a boost to a local artist, and generates oodles of street cred.
• While they don’t feature it in their eNewsletter, they do offer space for regular folks. T-shirt buyers can post photos of themselves wearing the shirt on its order page. Forget models: these people are hot, creative, and the best possible influencers for the brand.
• The eNewsletter is an accurate reflection of the brand and tells the same story. In the best of worlds, your outbound communication, website, retail store, brand, etc. all has a consistent tone, message, target audience, etc. Threadless lives in the best of worlds.

The loser: The New Republic

The New Republic (TNR) is a centrist-leftist twice-monthly journal of politics and culture. It’s not a bad magazine per se, but the eNewsletter is all types of awful. [Full disclosure: I used to work for a competitor/ally magazine.]

• It doesn’t say anything. Most of the content in the eNewsletter is a list of recent blog posts. However, with the all-too-clever titles, it’s usually impossible to discern what a particular blog post is about. What other critical information do they provide? The time and date?! Who cares? Let’s assume that it would be a wise business practice to increase your writers’ fame. Maybe you should list the author’s name next to their post. Then, I could follow along day to day and learn who I especially like. Encourage fans; don’t make it more difficult for them.
• The eNewsletter suffers from premature erudition. In other words, its info comes too soon. Barely have I finished reading yesterday’s edition and another is at my doorstep. Relax. If you publish twice per month, don’t feel pressured to bang down my door with your email every single day. I don’t want to start taking you for granted, baby. (Don’t worry, premature erudition happens to a lot of eNewsletters. Honest.)
• Ads galore! I would love to see how much space is taken up with ads versus content in this email. I count one banner at the top, two banners along the side, and there was another ad at the bottom that I cut. Add in the masthead and there’s not much space left for actual content. Imagine a television show where more than half of the running time was taken up by ads. Would you be more or less enticed to watch it? Cripes.
• This might verge on petty, but my last point is simply to stop trying to be all things to all people. Not many magazines do well with both politics and the arts and you’re not The Atlantic. Being center-left just makes everyone annoyed. I’m a big fan of picking one thing and being the number one resource about that thing. No offense TNR, but you just aren’t definitive enough for me. (Oh, and that ship logo is bizarre.)

Is there an eNewsletter that you think is due for some praise or derision? Send me an example at ireallylikerobots [at] gmail [dot] com and it might be featured in the next eNewsletter battle.

I could have bookmarked the URLs of company’s whose ads I enjoyed or told my friends about cool microsites I experienced, but I didn’t because the web was largely forgotten in this year’s ads. URLs were printed small and almost always at the end of the ad, there was only one example of user generated content, few (if any) microsites to continue the experience after the game, and generally poor use of search. What a waste of $2.7M.

Michael Estrin of iMedia Connection has a good wrap-up and several interviews of note. The question he pursues: where was the web? From Estrin’s article: “It was like we went backwards this year,” says Sean Cheyney, VP of marketing and business development at AccuQuote. “It’s like we’re moving back into silos. I was surprised that companies didn’t do more integration. The web was an afterthought for most of the ads.”

Beyond the 30-second Spot

AOL’s Annual Super Bowl Sunday Ad Poll ranked the Bud Light Dalmation-Clydesdale-Rocky ad was America’s favorite, yet it did not even have the requisite web address at the end. Here are a few quick ideas of ways you could have capitalized on this success (call me for more – my freelance rates are very reasonable):

• Contest to name the Dalmatian and Clydesdale
• Start a rivalry between Bud and Bud Light (represented by the dog and horse) similar to the Bud Bowls of the 90s
• MySpace page wraps in spots (Dalmatian) and tough-guy horse stuff (Clydesdale)
• Facebook app that allows you to send a Bud Light to a friend
• Advertising tie-in with the new Rambo movie (I imagine there’s audience cross-over with Rocky)
• Jab back at the new Miller Lite spot featuring…Dalmatians and Clydesdales
• Create a site where you integrate this ad with other Bud Light Super Bowl ads (have the dog breathing fire, the horse flying, etc)

Budweiser, what do you pay these marketing guys? Hire me or any 15 year old and you’ll get more web marketing bang-for-your-buck.

Failure to Launch

Any marketer worth their snuff – nay, conscious in the last year or two – knows that search is an integral part of any campaign. So, why this MediaWeek report:

“70 percent of Super Bowl advertisers bought some paid search ads on either Google, Yahoo, MSN – up close to 20 percent versus last year. But just 6 percent of advertisers used their 30-second spots to direct viewers to the Web, and the vast majority (93 percent) failed to buy search ads for alternative terms that were related to their ads, such as their spokesperson’s names, slogans or taglines.”

MediaWeek is reporting on a Reprise Media scorecard that goes into more detail. I find it amazing that roughly 93 percent (of the 70 percent who bought ads) failed to think of these ads from the user’s perspective. Your uncle Jimmy had knocked back a six-pack and was in the grip of a food coma when he saw Naomi Campbell dancing with a bunch of lizards. When he stumbles to the computer, he is not going to search for SoBe Lifewater. He’s going to search for “hot model and dancing lizards.” Little surprise that SoBe also ranked as a “fumble” on Reprise Media’s scorecard.

I Get By With a Little Help From My…Oh, Forget It

Only Doritos had the cojones to use user generated content. Despite it being ranked near the bottom, I thought the ad was okay. Doritos had a nice intro to the commercial, but I would have loved to see it end with the singer crunching into a Dorito. Cheesy, perhaps, but so is the product. My message to Frito-Lay/PepsiCo (who own Doritos): Don’t be rash in firing your advertising company. It is better to work with someone willing to take the big risks and use the medium that appeals to your audience. These are the folks with the potential to blow people out of the water.

Also, not a single advertiser drove viewers to their MySpace or Facebook page – there was zero social networking involved. Believe me, this isn’t because people aren’t using Facebook anymore.

Fox did drive people to www.myspace.com/superbowlads though, which is a nice way of increasing the ads value with a measurable online component. Of course, for $2.7M, I’d be wanting a little something extra too.

No one is complaining about a game of two huge franchises in the largest media markets where one of the teams has the chance to have a perfect season (and finally shut up the ’72 Dolphins). But if you’re an advertiser and next year pits the Titans versus the Buccaneers (no offense guys, but come on), you might want to start thinking about your other options. Joe over at Junta42 has some great ideas for how to spend all that cash.

ARG stands for “Alternate Reality Game”, as written about in the January issue of Wired magazine. Just this past weekend, I stumbled upon one while trying to figure out what the heck the movie Cloverfield was about (after clicking the link, see the “viral tie-ins” section at the bottom).

First, let’s get rid of the name. Alternate Reality? This ain’t the mid-90s. Besides, it’s not even accurate; there is nothing alternate reality about this process. I propose Online-Life-Game Amalgamations: OLGAs. Besides being more accurate (that these products operate online, in real life, and within a game in tandem), from a marketing perspective, doesn’t OLGA present a more pleasant image/sound in the mind than ARG?

OLGAs differ from other marketing efforts because rather than trying to breach the consumer’s interest through volume (push), they draw people in (pull). As the Wired article states, “That’s why [Weisman, the 'creator' of OLGAs] opted for a ‘subdural’ approach: Instead of shouting the message, hide it.” Thus, the consumer becomes a detective. Much like National Treasure, The Da Vinci Code, or anything by the immanent Paul Auster (especially The New York Trilogy), the author becomes part of the story, deciphering clues s/he had not realized were in plain sight, and needing to know not just where to look but to look at all. Again, from Wired:

“These narratives unfold in fragments, in all sorts of media…the audience pieces together the story from shards of information. The task is too complicated for any one person, but the Web enables a collective intelligence to emerge to assemble the piece, solve the mysteries, and in the process, tell and retell the story online. The narrative is shaped – and ultimately owned – by the audience in ways that other forms of storytelling cannot match. No longer passive consumers, the players live out the story. [my emphasis]“

You can read the article for background, examples, and a history of OLGAs, but I would like to flesh out three principles in this emerging field.

1. Definite entry points: All of the OLGAs I have read about have definite entry points, though ideally multiple mediums would be used. The examples of the Nine Inch Nails Year Zero campaign used multiple websites, a message on an answering machine, and flash drives hidden in restrooms at concerts. The multiple mediums almost act as second opinions – they build off of each other and support the legitimacy of each other.
2. Seamless integration into life: OLGAs derive some of their appeal from the way the games fit into a player’s life. After a threshold of suspension of disbelief, these games feel very real. You are not going to a “puzzle” webpage and “playing.” You are solving puzzles in real time with other people online.
3. Less Is More: OLGAs succeed from a marketing standpoint not only because they do not feel like marketing, but because they do not beat their message into the head of the consumer. In this instance, whispering is better than shouting.
4. OLGAs must be fair and have (some sort of) a conclusion: OLGAs tap into a primal human desire to solve things. From a dissertation on Paul Auster’s novels: “As another version of teleological classic art, detective text is obsessed with closure; the end comes not only as a salvation of the reader but at the same time gives reassurance that the reader is not be wandering in a wilderness of ambiguous signs. Everything that happens in a detective story must be placed under the perspective of a final truth.”

OLGAs are not for everyone: both creating and playing. Companies should realize the immense amount of work involved – from scheming it up, to creating content, to placing clues in the real world, to monitoring players’ progress. OLGAs burn through a lot of time and money. Likewise, companies should understand that their OLGA may not reach a huge number of people. Gauge response less on the number of people involved and more on their fervor. Remember that the fanboys are the ultimate evangelists.

Finally, here’s an article from MTV detailing some recent OLGAs. The critic confuses OLGAs with stupid publicity stunts, putting them both under the rubric of unconventional marketing. Truly unconventional, yes; but also in a class all of their own.