Creative Crowdsourcing For The Self-Employed
When you’re self-employed, your time is spread thin and budgets are tight. But, you know that differentiating your marketing in this competitive business environment is crucial to your success. Instead of spending time and effort hiring a marketing firm or ad agency, many entrepreneurs are leveraging the proven strategy of creative crowdsourcing for innovative creative at an affordable price.
Creative crowdsourcing is quicker, less expensive, easier, and offers far more choice
Creative crowdsourcing is the the business process of outsourcing tasks through an open call to a large group of designers, writers, musicians, filmmakers, etc., a la a “crowd.” In online marketplaces, Buyers can post their creative projects and name their own price and, in turn, creatives worldwide submit their ideas and the buyer chooses the one they like best.
Creative crowdsourcing is quicker, less expensive, easier, and offers far more choice. Here are five designs small businesses should consider crowdsourcing:
In fact, you might even think of creative crowdsourcing as a way to conduct an online focus group – but with access to a lot more people. As creative crowdsourcing continues to evolve, more and more entrepreneurs are tapping the crowd in ways far beyond simple logo and website designs.
Here are seven ways entrepreneurs can further leverage creative crowdsourcing:
1. Company Name: Naming your company is the essential part of your brand’s identity. The name will appear on your business cards, letterhead, website, promotional materials, products and pretty much everywhere in print to identify your company or your company’s products and/or services.
2. Package Graphics: Packaging design can make a profound difference on the sales of a product and how customers view it. Excellent packaging should sell the product and contribute to the overall product experience. Think of it as a sales board to advertise the benefits and attributes of your product and a way to stand out from the competition.
3. White Papers: A well-written technical paper adds credibility to your business and has the potential to accelerate revenue growth by increasing lead flow and sales. Creative writers not only know how to effectively organize a white paper but make it consistent with your brand’s tone and style.
4. Presentations: A good quality slide or PowerPoint template incorporates your business logo, graphics, color palettes and fonts throughout. Whether you require professionally designed slide decks, videos and animations for maximum impact or sophisticated custom-made interactive presentation tools, a professional presentation will help you get your message across while staying consistent with the look and feel of your brand.
5. Print or Online Ads: You spare no expenses to make your product/service; don’t shy away from using quality design for a print or online ad. A well designed ad can improve your image, grab attention, drive traffic to your website and create recall. A skilled graphic designer understands the complexities of the visual medium and knows how to utilize many strategies that help increase visual communication.
6. Apps: Apps are the buzz on the street. The average cost to design an app ranges from $6,000 to $30,000 but with creative crowdsourcing, apps designs on creative crowdsourcing sites like crowdSPRING, start at $269 for an icon design or illustration and $384 for an interface design.
7. E-newsletter: An e-newsletter can help establish your company as an authority on topics relevant to your business. The more potential and current customers believe that you are knowledgeable about the products or services that you offer, the stronger the business relationship. Save yourself the time and stress of finding the right words for your target audience.
How can you use creative crowdsourcing for your business? Share your ideas below.
Mike Samson is the co-founder of crowdSPRING (www.crowdspring.com), the world’s #1 marketplace for buyers and sellers of creative services who need custom logo design, web design, companynames or other design and writing projects. The crowdSPRING community has more than 117,000 designers and writers from more than 200 countries and has successfully handled more than 30,000 creative projects from buyers worldwide.