By partnering with the masses through innovative campaigns, companies can benefit from a vast amount of expertise, enthusiasm and goodwill, rather than from paid labour.<\/p>\n But what’s in it for the crowd?<\/p>\n Why do ordinary people sign on to help design or produce a product without much compensation? Why do they volunteer their time and skills to a company that profits? And how can a firm better address the crowd’s needs in order to to maximize value for all involved in the co-creation project?<\/p>\n Zeynep Arsel, associate professor of marketing at the John Molson School of Business, investigated these questions in a new article published by the Journal of the Association for Consumer Research<\/em>. The article was based on Eric Martineau’s thesis supervised by Arsel at the John Molson School of Business Master of Science Program.<\/p>\n For the study, Martineau and Arsel looked at two cases: Threadless, a growing company that uses the wisdom of the crowds to produce artistic T-shirts, and a Montreal-based startup that sought to use the same model for fashion accessories.<\/p>\n The researchers observed participants in the local startup, conducted interviews with community members and carefully monitored online forums to see who was participating and why — as well as what was in it for them.<\/p>\n Arsel and Martineau then analyzed the similarities and differences between the techniques successfully implemented by Threadless and the startup.<\/p>\n “Even though the startup ultimately didn’t succeed, our research gave us an invaluable opportunity to understand what works in co-creation projects and what does not,” Arsel says.<\/p>\n “This allowed us to explain why people participate in co-creation projects and what benefits they receive, other than monetary compensation<\/strong>.”<\/p>\n Their findings are the first to show that there are four different types of members volunteering in these communities:<\/p>\n 1. Communals<\/strong> build skills and community bonds;<\/p>\n 2. Utilizers<\/strong> join the communities to sharpen their skills without much intention to form social bonds;<\/p>\n 3. Aspirers<\/strong> lack both skills and bonds, but aim to gain more of both;<\/p>\n 4. Tourists<\/strong> are minimally invested in both community and skills and infrequently participate.<\/p>\n “For some members, the bonds established through these communities matter most. Others simply participate in co-creation projects to sharpen their Photoshop skills or get better at design in general,” Arsel explains.<\/p>\n She adds that the presence of all four types of members in a collective creativity project is not only essential for the company itself, but also beneficial for other members<\/strong>.<\/p>\n The researchers found that different kinds of members work together to not only create value for the firm, but also to generate benefits for themselves and other members<\/strong>, such as social connections, status within online communities and improved skills.<\/p>\n “If companies better understand the value that participants receive and what they get out of this arrangement, they can manage these communities to maximize value for both sides. It’s a win-win situation.”<\/p>\n Partners in research: This study was funded in part by FQRSC and the Petro Canada Young Innovators Program.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" From the Concordia University press release: From Wikipedia to 99designs, and Google to LEGO, crowdsourcing has changed the way the world does business. By partnering with the masses through innovative… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[95,8],"tags":[192,306,364,12,98],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20463"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20463"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20463\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20494,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20463\/revisions\/20494"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20463"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20463"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20463"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"http:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/Community.jpg\")
From Wikipedia to 99designs, and Google to LEGO, crowdsourcing has changed the way the world does business<\/strong>.<\/p>\n