1. #Crowdsourcing and #social media:
influencing the future of engagement
By Catherine Loiacono
@cat_loiacono
#newhouseprsm
August 1, 2013

2. Crowdsourcing and social media are
breaking down the silos of public relations
and marketing and helping create
authentic engagement.
R1: How are businesses using
crowdsourcing and social media to
engage key audiences
R2: How is crowdsourcing and social
media transforming the way we look at
PR and Marketing?
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2
Theory and Research Q’s

3. Thought leaders
Mark W. Schaefer is a globally-recognized blogger,
speaker, educator, business consultant, and author who
blogs at {grow} — one of the top marketing blogs of the
world.
Mark has worked in global sales, PR, and marketing
positions for nearly 30 years and now provides
consulting services as Executive Director of U.S.-based
Schaefer Marketing Solutions. He specializes in social
media training and clients include both start-ups and
global brands such as IBM, AT&T, Johnson & Johnson,
and the UK government.
Author of Return On Influence, Born to Blog, and Tao of
Twitter.
Mark Schaefer
@markwschaefer
Tennessee/New York
businessesGROW.com

4. Thought leaders
David Meerman Scott is a marketing strategist, advisor
to emerging companies, bestselling author of eight
books including three international bestsellers, and a
professional speaker on topics including marketing,
leadership, and social media.
David serves as an advisor to emerging companies in
the marketing technology category including HubSpot,
GrabCAD, Libboo, VisibleGains, ExpertFile, GutCheck,
and Newstex.
Author of News Jacking, Real-time Marketing and PR
and the New Rules of Marketing and PR
David Meerman Scott
@dmscott
Boston
davidmeermanscott.com

5. Thought leaders
John Winsor is a leading strategic marketing and product
innovation thinker known for his work in collaboration,
co-creation and crowdsourcing.
He is the CEO of Victors & Spoils, the world’s first
creative advertising agency built on crowdsourcing.
Named to:
• Agency A-List 10 to Watch list
• Mashable’s Top 5 Digital Agencies.
John Winsor
@jtwinsor
Boulder, Colorado
Victorsandspoils.com

6. Social Media
Social media is a powerful platform that
encompasses countless virtual communities
and networks where people can :
– exchange information
– express ideas
– share opinions
– create content
– seek out new knowledge.
“The town hall has
probably given
way to the internet
as the most
prominent and
accessible
dimension of the
public sphere.” -
Calhoun

7. Social Media
Uses today include:
– Generates revenue and opportunity
– Powerful distribution channel
– Communicates your point of view
– Compelling and Addictive
– Creates the strong “feeling of
connectedness”
– Accessibility to brands and leaders are now
accessible.
If you create
great content
that’s worthy of
attention, the
world will show up
and talk about it.”
– Jeff Bullas

8. Social Media
From a PR perspective:
– Two-way symmetrical communication
– never have word of mouth or peer to peer
influence been more ubiquitous than today
From Marketing Perspective
–Social Media is a powerful marketing medium
to generate revenue and distribute content
– 93% of marketers use social media for
business
From a Marketing and PR perspective:
– Web 2.0: no longer passive browsers of the
web, but we are the web.

9. Crowdsourcing: what is it?
Coined by Jeff Howe in a June 2006
Wired magazine article:
“Crowdsourcing is the process by which
the power of the many can be
leveraged to accomplish feats that were
once the province of a specialized few.”
An effective way for orgs to get best ideas from online
communities and build communities.

10. Still in infancy phase, trying to
carve out its space
– Curated Crowds
– Quality improvements
– Standardizing
– Early adoption phase
–Gaining corporate acceptance
Crowdsourcing: in the making

11. Crowdsourcing: its uses
Ways to use crowdsourcing:
•Generate solutions to questions
•Ask for suggestions
•Encourage people to vote or rank a list
of items
•Slice a large project into smaller tasks
•Get expert opinions quickly
•Solicit donations
•Generate interest in attending an
event

12. In the last three years, global firms
are picking up on this new means of
engagement
Market demand for crowd-sourced
work quintupled in 2010 & almost
quadrupled in 2011
Starting to see more partnership with
crowdsourcing firms and agencies
Crowdsourcing: gaining momentum

13. Crowdsourcing and Social Media
Firms are using crowdsourcing and social
media to complete marketing-related
tasks.
Focus on three broad areas:
• product development
• advertising and promotion
• marketing research
Some examples:
• American Idol and X-Factor
• Brandbowl 2011
• Seth Godin using crowdfunding to
publish book

14. Threadless.com
T-shirt company started out as a
high school project over ten years
ago by owner Jake Nickell
Org. is integrating crowdsourcing,
social media, marketing and public
relations
Crowdsourcing is the primary goal
but spin-off benefits are just as vital
• 2-way Communication
• Promotion
• Profit
• Building community

15. My Starbucks Idea

16. Victors and Spoils
V&S is based on the principles of
crowdsourcing. First open ad
agency.
• Goal: solve some of the issues
that exist in the application of
crowdsourcing to Big-Brand
Marketing or Advertising
Strategy.
• Fan Machine is a Facebook
app by Victors & Spoils that
allows any brand’s fans to
submit ideas against various
briefs that the brand puts
forth – right on that brand’s
Facebook fan page.

17. #Skills4BC campaign

18. Findings from thought leaders
The key to consistently tapping the wisdom of crowds is to
encourage affinity groups to form – and then provide
them with context, constraints, and even expert guidance.
That way they can channel their energy and thinking
into actionable insights to help the org. -@markschaefer
When people help you answer a question via
crowdsourcing they feel a sense of ownership.
Participation turns spectators into supporters - @dmscott
Collaboration, co-creation and crowdsourcing are the
future of not only advertising, but business itself; and that
a deep dedication to becoming a social business can make
the world a better place. - @jtwinsor

19. Findings from thought leaders
What we are experiencing is the most
important communications revolution in our
history since the printing press, 600 years ago.
Crowdsouring and Social media are, no
question part of the comms revolution
Crowd sourcing and social media are two small
pieces of it. At a micro level they are helping
enable this revolution.
David M. Scott
@dmscott

20. Findings from thought leaders
With crowdsourcing you can ask for opinions about
features that go into a product.
With social media you can engage in the two-way
symmetrical communication.
People will blog about it, they feel connected to the
product and brand.
The silos in marketing and PR are clearly being
broken down, but it is much more than
crowdsourcing and social media.
On-line there isn’t a mass demarcation between
marketing and PR, consumers are don’t care where
they get their content.
David M. Scott
@dmscott

21. Findings from thought leaders
10 years from now, people will look at
crowdsourcing and social media like we
do plaid pants because it’s simply
another aspect of Marketing and PR.
Through opening up of
communications, crowdsourcing
becomes marketing and PR.
With the evolution we are seeing right
now, 10 years from now, marketing
and PR will be one.
David M. Scott
@dmscott

22. Findings from thought leaders
We are in the first phase of this transformation.
I believe that more than the silos of marketing
and public relations are being broken down.
Silos of innovation to purchasing to vendors are
all being integrated.
Every part of the organization is changing.
Today, it is total new way of doing business.
John Winsor
@jtwindsor

23. Findings from thought leaders
Social media started to build audiences. In the
last year, now that those audiences are built,
business are asking what can I do with them?
One of the stumbling blocks is that brands are
used to controlling and commanding the
message.
If brand has a strong community than
crowdsourcing and engagement becomes
easier.
John Winsor
@jtwindsor

24. Conclusion: Crowdsourcing and Social
• Social media is transforming the way we think of crowdsourcing.
• Social media is becoming an essential component to crowdsourcing as it
allows organizations to reach a wider audience faster, cheaper and more
efficiently than ever before.
• Current crowdsourcing campaigns almost always use social media to
obtain a higher number of contributions
• Can lead to a better quality idea, service or whatever the desired end-
product might be.
• As social media monitoring technology becomes increasingly popular and
sophisticated more organizations will pay closer attention to how social
media can be used to fuel their crowdsourcing campaigns.

25. Conclusion: Crowdsourcing and Social
• Crowdsourcing and social has the potential to:
– build trust with consumer,
– allow for authentic engagement,
– two-way communication
– enables community to help shape future of
organization
– Stimulates innovation
– AND, helps solve problems.

26. Conclusion: big picture
• We are in the midst of a communications revolution and each
of us is contributing to its shape.
• Crowdsourcing and social media are breaking down the silos
of public relations and marketing and helping create
authentic engagement but they are only two components of a
larger communications revolution.
• Businesses are catching on and Marketing and PR together
can drive this change.
• 10 years from now, crowdsourcing and social media will be
looked at as something we did.
• Marketing and PR will be one.

27. Questions