It’s Getting Crowded in Here

There seems to be two emerging theories of thought on crowdsourcing, i.e., consumer-generated media. It’s good, and it’s not.

Just over the past couple days I’ve read a number of reviews on Starbucks’ latest brainchild, called My Starbucks Idea. The idea is that Buckies (copyright Matthew Fiorentino) go to the site and pour their hearts out about all their most intimate desires, longings, and kinky cravings about everything and anything Starbucktastic. Together they will shape the future of Starbucks.

The first reviews I read showered Starbucks with praise. Finally, companies are beginning to understand that they don’t define the brand–the customers do. Giving the consumers a seat at the table will make them feel like part of the family. By allowing customers help shape the future of the company, they will have a stronger tie to the brand. Etc.

But then the naysayers started coming out of the woodworks. People are saying that it doesn’t fit with the brand, that the problem that Starbucks answers as a brand is a quality of life issue. They’re saying it’s too little too late. They’re saying that overzealous Buckies could demand some ideas (like free espresso Monday) that could put the company at odds with its fans.

I’m starting to side with the naysayers. The Starbucks idea sounds more and more like a contrived community, a Hail Mary idea that sinks its teeth into what’s popular right now.

It’s not that I don’t think an online community for Starbucks could work, I just think that hasn’t been framed correctly. Instead of having customers give them ideas about how to make Starbucks better, why not have customers write about what Starbucks means to them in their daily struggle with the universe? Have a contest centered around the difference Starbucks makes in Buckies’ lives. Or take a cue from The Daily Show and The Colbert Report when Starbucks closed its doors for three hours to retrain its employees and have people talk about what they would do without Starbucks. People could vote on the best story and the winner would get free Starbucks for life.

This would get people involved while providing a reminder to Buckies why they love Starbucks so much. It would also help define the brand–it’s not what we say it is, it’s what the customers say it is, right? Contests like these would provide unlimited feedback.

It also creates an easier path to a community. It would encourage people to read about other Buckies’ stories and engage them in a way ideas about the perfect Starbucks could never do. If Starbucks did it correctly, it could even turn into a social networking experience. People who live in the same area with the same interests love the same thing about Starbucks writing from two different computers who have seen each other before but didn’t know it was them and always wanted to muster up the courage to talk to the other one but could never do it until they find each other at StarbucksStories.com and then they finally meet, unexpectedly, at Starbucks and they fall head over heels in love but he’s a Jewish black man from Malaysia and she’s an Asian Morman from Guadalajara and what would their parents say… It’s not only good marketing, it’s got Hollywood potential, baby!

To see crowdsourcing at its finest, check out Toyota’s Scion. They seem to have figured out the dosage. They recently announced that proud Scion owners, Scionists (copyright Matthew Fiorentino), will be able to go to their website to design their own logos for their Scion mobiles. This is a holistic call for community. Scionists love their Scions and tend towards accessorizing, just like HOGs. Allowing them to create their own logos for their own rides fits perfectly with what they’re trying to do.

Even if they’re just part of the crowd.