Crowdsourcing For Dummies

Give your business the edge with crowd-power! Crowdsourcing is an innovative way of outsourcing tasks, problems or requests to a group or community online. There are lots of ways business can use crowdsourcing to their advantage: be it crowdsourcing product ideas and development, design tasks, market research, testing, capturing or analyzing data, and even raising funds. It offers access to a wide pool of talent and ideas, and is an exciting way to engage the public with your business. Crowdsourcing For Dummies is your plain-English guide to making crowdsourcing, crowdfunding and open innovation work for you. It gives step-by-step advice on how to plan, start and manage a crowdsourcing project, where to crowdsource, how to find the perfect audience, how best to motivate your crowd, and tips for troubleshooting.

Autorentext

David Alan Grier is a writer, teacher and consultant on labour, technology, communication and management. He is Associate Professor at George Washington University, where he teaches International Science and Technology Policy. He is also the 2013 President of the IEEE Computer Society.

Klappentext

**Learn how to harness people power for an unbeatable competitive edge!

Netflix used it to improve its ability to predict customers' movie ratings. L'Oreal used it to create a television advert for a tiny fraction of what it would've cost ordinarily. Dell used it to generate thousands of new product ideas and improvements. And now in Crowdsourcing For Dummies, David Alan Grier demonstrates how you can tap into the awesome power of the crowd. Discover how to use crowdsourcing to solve complex business problems and complete difficult tasks, supercharge innovation and new product development, build brand identity and boost productivity and profits.

• ***Hit the ground running quickly get up to speed on basic crowdsourcing concepts and technologies and discover how to develop a surefire crowdsourcing strategy
• Know your options find out about all forms of crowdsourcing, including crowdcontests, crowdfunding, macrotasking, microtasking and self-organised crowds
• Locate the best crowdsourcing platforms know where to look for your crowd, identify the right audience and promote your project to them
• Manage your crowd with confidence find out how to communicate with your crowd and keep them interested and motivated
• Keep the wheels spinning learn how to manage the crowdsourcing process, and troubleshoot common problems

• Get in with the in-crowd learn from ten of the best crowdsourcing success stories

  Open the book and find:

• **Ways to make crowdsourcing work for your business
• The lowdown on conducting market research and analysing data
• How to raise funds through a crowdfunding project
• Techniques for engaging people with your company or product
• Advice on designing tasks for your crowd to tackle
• Pointers for finding the perfect platform and audience
• How to keep your crowd motivated

Zusammenfassung
Give your business the edge with crowd-power! Crowdsourcing is an innovative way of outsourcing tasks, problems or requests to a group or community online. There are lots of ways business can use crowdsourcing to their advantage: be it crowdsourcing product ideas and development, design tasks, market research, testing, capturing or analyzing data, and even raising funds. It offers access to a wide pool of talent and ideas, and is an exciting way to engage the public with your business.

Crowdsourcing For Dummies is your plain-English guide to making crowdsourcing, crowdfunding and open innovation work for you. It gives step-by-step advice on how to plan, start and manage a crowdsourcing project, where to crowdsource, how to find the perfect audience, how best to motivate your crowd, and tips for troubleshooting.

Inhalt

Introduction 1

About This Book 1

Conventions Used in This Book 2

What You're Not to Read 2

Foolish Assumptions 3

How This Book Is Organised 4

Part I: Understanding Crowdsourcing Basics 4

Part II: Looking at the Different Forms of Crowdsourcing 4

Part III: Building Skill 4

Part IV: Getting All You Can Get from the Crowd 5

Part V: The Part of Tens 5

Icons Used in This Book 5

Where to Go from Here 6

Part I: Understanding Crowdsourcing Basics 7

Chapter 1: People Power: Getting a Feel for Crowdsourcing 9

What is This Thing Called Crowdsourcing? 10

Seeing how crowdsourcing works 10

Looking at crowdsourcing forms 11

Considering Why People Crowdsource 13

Introducing three key strengths 13

Benefitting from crowdsourcing 14

Considering reliability 15

Being a Crowdworker 16

Becoming a Crowdsourcer 17

Chapter 2: Getting to Know the Forms of Crowdsourcing and Crowdmarkets 19

Harnessing the Power of Divided Labour 20

Keeping the job whole 20

Splitting the job into big pieces 21

Dividing the job as small as you can 22

Letting the crowd divide the job 23

Using crowdsourcing to raise money 24

Looking at the Rules that Govern How Crowdmarkets Work 25

Distinguishing between contract and contest markets 27

Understanding collaborative and independent crowdworking 27

Combining the two rules 28

Chapter 3: Infiltrating the Crowd 29

Following the Crowdworker's Steps 30

Taking Lessons from Your Time as a Crowdworker 32

Lesson 1: Crowdworkers have names and reputations 32

Lesson 2: Crowds need training 33

Lesson 3: Crowds want clear instructions 34

Lesson 4: Crowds are free to move 34

Joining the Staff of Wikipedia 35

Registering as a worker 35

Choosing a task 36

Completing a task 36

Submitting a task 36

Leaping into the Market with Amazon's Mechanical Turk 37

Registering as a worker 37

Selecting the task 38

Qualifying and completing the task 39

Donning the White Lab Coat: Zooniverse 41

Chapter 4: Joining the Crowdforce 43

Deciding to Join the Crowdforce 44

Considering Your Options 46

Looking at microtasks 47

Competing for the contest 48

Lining up for macrotasks 48

Wading into self-organised crowds 49

Searching for careers in crowdfunding 50

Getting Up and Running on a Macrotask Crowdmarket 51

Choosing a market 51

Setting yourself up on the market 52

Building your portfolio 53

Protecting Yourself as a Macrotasker 53

Making the Bid in Macrotasking 54

The proposal 55

The covering letter 55

The résumé 57

Setting the price 57

Learning from the process 58

Completing the Macrotask 58

Remembering the goal 58

Communicate, communicate, communicate 59

Working across cultures 59

Keeping good records 60

Getting an extra recommendation 60

Part II: Looking at the Different Forms of Crowdsourcing 61

Chapter 5: Creating Crowdcontests 63

Reaping the Benefits of Crowdcontests 63

Deepening understanding 64

Faster, better, cheaper 65

Understanding Types of Crowdcontest 66

Running a Crowdcontest 67

Stating the goal 68

Writing the rules 69

Publicising the results 72

Improving the Crowdcontest 73

Splitting the contest 74

Building a stronger crowd 75

Running a series of contests 76 Considering an Exam...