Some people are disproportionately more likely to come up with original, out-of-the-box ideas. Scientists found that the brain of these creatives is ‘wired’ differently; creative people are better at engaging brain systems that typically don’t work together. As a result, they address situations in an atypical way and challenge the status quo. In the 90-9-1 rule, they are the noteworthy 1%, which we label as ‘creative consumers’. Since these creatives are a rare breed, brands increasingly rely on creative crowdsourcing to get access to their fresh ideas and inspiration.
Below, Katerina Stavrellis, Consumer & Marketing Insights Specialist at The Arnott’s Group, explains how our proprietary network of creative consumers inspired the team with new snacking flavors.
Katerina Stavrellis
Consumer & Marketing Insights Specialist
The Arnott’s Group
For The Arnott’s Group, Australia’s largest biscuit producer, working with InSites’ eÿeka network of creative consumers has been our first creative crowdsourcing experience. The biggest driver to trying this new approach was our observation that ideation with everyday consumers does not always give the desired results. Similar for internal ideation efforts – we were coming up with the same ideas over and over again. This is no surprise, as we are all consumers influenced by what we see in the supermarket, and marketers reading the same trend reports. The team needed an extra spark of fresh ideas to excite our consumers, and eÿeka did exactly that. They inspired our thinking with new elements we hadn’t considered before.
We asked the eÿeka members to come up with new and exciting flavors for Shapes, a savory biscuit cracker range. It was fascinating to see how an international crowd of creative people interpreted the Australian market and came up with ideas. For example, a few ideas were based around native ingredients. They also took a different perspective. We might have fixed ideas on how broad a product range is, but creative consumers do not have this frame of reference, easily thinking outside the box, to identify new opportunities. While not an objective of this project, some of the eÿeka ideas also inspired our social media content. There was an idea around a ‘love or hate’ range – of polarizing flavors like coriander – which we posted as a conversation starter on our channels, and it generated great responses, definitely creating some buzz.
The true value of creative crowdsourcing is not only in the fresh ideas, but also in the work with the InSites Consulting team afterwards, going from a long list of ideas to curated output. By merging and building on the initial ideas, you really come to something completely new. I’m confident we will tap into the creativity of the crowd more in the future, not only for product development, but also for brand communication and activation.
Different people come with a different set of unique skills and competences. Research has shown that out of every 100 people, 90 merely consume content, 9 will like, share or react to what is created, and only 1 will actually create something. And this is no different for consumers.
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