In the second part of my series “Crowd Surfing to CrowdSourcing – Better Business Through Collaboration” we will cover

IDEA SOURCING

Idea Sourcing is simply the process of allowing anyone in an identified group, party, or network to make suggestions to help solve problems, come up with ideas, and create initiatives.

In other words, instead of sitting up all night worrying about how to best position your company for a specific client you are pitching, you allow people from varying backgrounds and areas of expertise to make suggestions.

It’s as if you’re using multiple computers networked together to solve a problem instead of just the one you are sitting at.

In this case, your brain is the computer.

If you have ever enjoyed an animated series from Pixar, you should know they did not animate, shade, and render those films such as Toy Story or Finding Nemo on one computer! As obvious as that sounds, why do we take that very approach? Most great masterpieces require involvement, engagement, and collaboration.

If you’re not familiar with the term, I want to introduce you to an extremely important concept called:

Social Capital

Wikipedia defines Social Capital as:

… a sociological concept used in business, economics, organizational behaviour, political science, public health and the social sciences in general to refer to connections within and between social networks. Though there are a variety of related definitions, which have been described as “something of a cure-all”^[1] for the problems of modern society, they tend to share the core idea “that social networks have value. Just as a screwdriver (physical capital) or a college education (human capital) can increase productivity (both individual and collective), so do social contacts affect the productivity of individuals and groups”.

Your friends, families, co-workers, employees, neighbors, you name it, all have different “values” than you.

We can discuss the reasons why some friends are closer than others, or why you avoid that one co-worker all day long, and yet we rarely ever think about the business value our relationships carry.

While this is a favorite topic of mine, I will keep this on topic by simply saying that in my experience there is no reason not to tap into the Social Capital in my life other than ignorance of the abilities possessed by the people in my life or my own pride and fear!

So with this working definition of Social Capital, let’s look a little further at the process of Idea Sourcing.

Probably the easiest way to do this is online where people feel the most comfortable to engage.

While you can offer opportunities where a profile of the user is not available (so they feel more comfortable),  you might want to be careful with that option because you are inherently throwing out a great deal of “data” about their suggestion.

It is important to note here that the greatest results to date with Idea Sourcing have come from offering a wide array of people with varying ideologies, educations, and life experience the ability to engage… not just who you think would have good ideas.

Always remember: the laws of “small worlds” or “social networks” cannot be predetermined. You will always be amazed at what someone knows or has experienced beyond what you could ever have imagined!

Let’s look at one of my favorite examples I have been talking about for almost 2 years now:

CASE STUDY: Threadless.com

Before Threadless.com came on the scene, we had all been to apparel websites and perhaps even visited a few T-shirt websites.

I want you to think about the process of creating and selling t-shirts online.  There’s the costs of design, manufacturing, advertising, processing, shipping, customer service and returns.

But the biggest problem is that the consumer has to shop and shop to find anything unique and honestly most t-shirt sites at the time were all selling the same fare.

Enter threadless.com

The concept is so simple, it passes us all by.

Create an online environment that allows anyone to upload a design for a t-shirt.

Then once a month have a vote for the best artwork of that month.

The person selected then has their artwork put into limited T-shirt runs (ensuring demand) and… voila!

You have your super cool T-shirt business.

But here’s the part most of us miss: they have outsourced the most expensive and risky parts of their business.

They are not paying for design work AND they know that the t-shirts will sell because of the number of people who voted for it!

SO they mitigated risk (they don’t have boxes and boxes of t-shirts in storage somewhere because they couldn’t sell them…like I did once)

One more vital component here… think about the mind and basic nature of an artist who would upload their designs.

What do you think the possibilities are that artists will do their best to make sure everyone they know sees their art work and buys a T-shirt?

Pretty good, right?

This process creates a new, natural, organic, viral campaign EVERY MONTH for Threadless!

Just because they are an online business doesn’t mean there aren’t great applications of this model for your brick and mortar business.

Just remember: when a consumer BELIEVES they have a say in the decision or outcome of a business they immediately feel a sense of loyalty.

And it’s that loyalty you build upon.

Let’s look at just a few methods and tools you can use in your own business.

TOOLS

There are many great tools available to you ranging from Social Media to surveys and polls.

Social Media - there are so many great social media tools for this I could dedicate an entire blog to this subject, so I will just cover a few for now.

LinkedIn

This is probably my favorite!

No matter how many times I give this tip when I speak, I am always amazed at how many people have not heard of it.

In LinkedIn there is a brilliant feature titled “Answers”.

It’s a bit misleading because it isn’t just answers, but questions as well.

You can post a question about any topic and direct it to specific markets.

For example, if you are a small business owner and you just had a serious problem with your CPA or bookkeeper you can log in to LinkedIn and create a question such as “what should I look for in a great CPA?”

You can then select who in what market (because in LinkedIn you have to select a preselected field of work when you create a profile) you want to submit this to.

Now I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking the answers you receive will be shameless self-promotion such as:

Answer: Yeah, I do. Hire me!

That does occur from time to time, but you will be amazed at the overall quality of answers, referrals and long term contacts you will receive.

Remember, people behave on LinkedIn because it’s for business and their peers are always watching:)

Twitter

I hear all the time how frustrated people get with Twitter because they don’t know what to talk about and they can’t seem to get people to engage them. Yet these same people are facing decisions, comparisons, and challenges all day every day!

Sounds like a great match to me!

Ask questions on Twitter and you will get answers. If you need to ask questions to a specific market, and you don’t have many of these users following you, then head over to sites like Twellow.com

and search by interest. When you find the market you are looking for, follow the people listed. When they follow back , as most do, you’ll have your free market research waiting for you!

Grow your networks by solving problems whether they be your own or someone else’s.

Surveys and Poll

LinkedIn

Again, LinkedIn weighs in at the top of my list because they offer you a polling feature cleverly titled… “Poll“!

LinkedIn says it best “Add the Polls application and leverage the wisdom of millions of business professionals on LinkedIn.”

There is even a paid option so you can submit your poll to users you are not connected to if you need to access their brains!

Of course Facebook has a slew of applications that allow you to survey your friends. Check out their options here: Facebook survey applications.

I have not used this myself but have been told several times that http://twtpoll.com is awesome for polling your Twitter community.

Now if you’re looking for options you can email or place on your blog or website then I suggest any of these:

FREE:

surveymonkey.com

polldaddy.com

PAID:

Constant Contact

While many people use Constant Contact for their Ezines and email lists, few realize they offer an amazing survey tool at an additional cost.

I have found that instead of setting up separate polls for every site, you can simply create one, place it on your blog or website, and then, if your Social Media funnel is set up correctly (like we teach you),  you can direct folks from your Twitter, FB or LinkedIn accounts to the poll on your blog or site.

Regardless of your business model and challenges, I encourage you to experiment with Idea Sourcing.  If you have even half the results we have, and our clients have, you will make it a primary part of your business.

So what do you think? Let me hear from you and please post your thoughts and questions below.