Strategic guide to Crowdsourcing a Video Marketing Campaign

www.geniusrocket.com | hello@geniusrocket.com


A Strategic Guide to Crowdsourcing a Video Campaign: An Introduction
Crowdsourcing can be unfamiliar territory for some businesses. Even though several crowdsourcing marketing
companies have become well refined and trustworthy in recent years, it is still challenging for most brand
managers to assess and participate in this new marketplace.

As protector of your brand, you want a secure process that’s free of risks when you implement your marketing
strategy. So… how can you do that?

We have developed a framework with process checks that can help. By using these, we’re confident you’ll choose
the right steps along every phase of the process and become familiar with the crowdsourcing model and
effectiveness.

Table of Contents
1. Definition of Business Goals ........................................................................................................................................................................... 3
2. Creative Partner Assessment- Crowdsourcing or Traditional?..................................................................................................... 4
3. Concept Generation ............................................................................................................................................................................................ 6
4. Concept Validation and Risk Management .............................................................................................................................................. 7
5. Production ............................................................................................................................................................................................................... 8
6. Distribution- Online, TV, or Both?................................................................................................................................................................ 8
7. Performance Management and Iteration ................................................................................................................................................. 9
Online Video Life Cycle Management ............................................................................................................................................................ 10
In Closing .................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 11

GeniusRocket: A Strategic Guide to Crowdsourcing a Video Campaign
To download an electronic copy, visit www.geniusrocket.com/whitepaper |2


1. Definition of Business Goals
It’s still a big mystery on how to translate video performance into gauges of success. But by setting up clear
business objectives and thinking ahead how you can measure them through video analytics, you can significantly
improve your performance measurements. Of course, understanding your business objective will also steer your
campaign in the right direction.

The following grid can be a starting point on how you can tie measuring tactics to objectives. Note that the
marked points are for illustrative purposes only and may differ from your assessment. To download a blank
grid in .xlsx or .pdf format, visit www.geniusrocket.com/whitepaper.



2. Creative Partner Assessment- Crowdsourcing or Traditional?
In some instances, it makes sense to stick to the traditional route you’ve been sticking to, while in other cases it
behooves you not to take advantage of crowdsourcing. It is important to recognizethere are differences amongst
crowdsourcing agencies. There are two major operating models:
 Open or contest-based crowdsourcing modelsput your creative brief, style guide and brand assets
onto an open social platform for anyone to access. While this may yield a broad array of creative
choices, it leaves important brand assets outside of your, or the agency’s, control. Open crowdsourcing
models also lack any quality assurance opportunity. Once the creative brief is released, the brand and
agency have limited or no interaction through the production process.
 Closed or curated crowdsourcing models offer a more closed environment with a creative
community that is vetted and professional. A professional community leverages the quality of the
members over the quantity, and reduces creative concepts deemed inappropriate or off-message.
Incremental steps for concept evaluation and testing provide the benefit of the crowdsourcing ideation
phase. This phase also provides brands with the quality assurance and security they require. You
should expect a crowdsourcing agency, with appropriate QA controls, to execute work at least on par
with any traditional creative agency.
If you are evaluating which agency to choose, it can be very useful to do a side-by-side analysis. We’ve provided
the following Shaded Grid Analysis and Opportunity Cost and ROI Evaluationgrids to help you prioritize your
video needs and rank the agencies. To download a blank grid in .xlsx or .pdf format, visit
www.geniusrocket.com/whitepaper.

Shaded Grid Analysis
To use the grid effectively: Ranking Categories
1. List the qualities you’re looking for in your agency 1 Mediocre
2. Rank them in priority 2 Sub-Average
3. Color each agency you’re considering according to how you believe they 3 Average
fare on that quality(ranking categories to the right) 4 Excellent
4. Assess overall strengths of each agency when finished 5 Supreme

Importance Level
Video Agency (1= Not Impt.,
Traditional Crowdsourcing Crowdsourcing
Capabilities Agency Agency 1 Agency 2
5= Extremely Impt.)

Guarantees variety of
creative, high impact
concepts

Is low cost and agile with
budgets/needs

Executes quick
turnaround

Keeps your creative
brief /business strategies
private

Guarantees quality

Shows strong portfolio

Shows strong experience
with relevant vertical

High caliber of creative
professionals



Opportunity Costs and ROI
It is very compelling to assess what residual budget you can expect from each agency that you are considering.
You can then evaluate how to allocate those extra dollars to other aspects of your marketing campaign.

Estimating ROI can be challenging since you won’t know how the video impact will differ across agencies.
However, if you make a basic assumption that the return on the video campaign will be similar across agencies,
you’ll quickly see how the ROI will be significantly higher through a crowdsourcing agency because of the low
cost of investment.

To download a blank grid in .xlsx or .pdf format, visit www.geniusrocket.com/whitepaper.

Of course, there are a host of other factors that will influence your decision on which agency to choose, such as
client portfolio, qualityof the creative community, and service reputation.

The next stages of this strategic guide works under the assumption that your company has decided to proceed
with using a crowdsourcing agency.



3. Concept Generation
The first big step will be to flush out a creative brief to be sent out to the agency’s community. A crowdsourcing
agency will give you a creative brief with questions that are no different than ones you would expect from any
smart traditional agency.Below is an exhaustive checklist of questions that may be asked.

How in depth you’ll want your answers to be will depend on how protective you are of your marketing strategy.
As mentioned previously, based on the agency there are variable levels of project privacy offered:

 Open or contest-based crowdsourcing models. In this model, the privacy level is low. Typically,
crowdsourcing contest sites are open for anyone to participate, including students and non-professionals.
On the plus side, you’ll receive a high quantity of creative concepts back. Also, if it enhances your marketing
strategy, you can promote the contest to engage your customer base. However, since your brief is open for
anyone to access, you may not feel secure divulging certain key marketing strategies. This may throw
participants off-path from the creative concepts you are hoping for. In addition, if you do disclose key
marketing strategies, you run the risk of exposing them to your competitors.
 Closed or curated crowdsourcing models. In this model, privacy level is high.Your project is protected by
NDA’s, allowing you to safely disclose confidential information. Your brief will be sent to a select few vetted
professionals only after they’re deemed qualified to execute your project,and have signed the NDA. The
downside is that you won’t get as many creative concepts to evaluate as you would from an open model,
since the creative brief is sent to a small subset of vetted community members.

Understand the privacy guidelines of your crowdsourcing agency, and make sure they fall in line with your video
strategy before you pull the trigger and submit your brief.



4. Concept Validation and Risk Management
Once you’ve submitted your brief and set a deadline, you’ll receive several written creative concepts from the
crowd to consider for your campaign.

Evaluating the Concepts
Again, the number of concepts you’ll receive will depend on the crowdsourcing agency you use. In an open
model, you can get an explosive number of concepts to evaluate. While it cantake longer to process, you can
potentially identify several concepts that you wish to take into production. The drawback is that if the
community is not vetted, you’ll have to evaluate both the good AND bad ideas. Some agencies provide support
and/or public voting functions to help sift out the stronger concepts.

Some open model agencies go as far as to skip the written concepts phase, and ask their community to create the
end product- the actual video- to submit for public review. If you are looking to engage your customer base into
the crowdsourcing process, then this type or process makes the most sense. If your objective is to create a high
quality and professional video, however, this process will most likely be insufficient in meeting your needs.

In a closed model, you should typically expect around 15-30 concepts back from accomplished professionals.
While this is not as high of a number as what an open model could provide, these professionals are vetted based
on their experience developing the type of campaign you are looking for. The chances you’ll receive high-impact
concepts that align with your vision are strong. Some agencies also guarantee that until you identify the
concept(s) you want to move forward with, they’ll continue to vet the community for more high quality ideas.

Deciding on the Concept to Take Into Production
The amount of control you have over deciding which concept you want to take to production will differ based on
the agency you choose. No matter what, as protector of your brand you need to inject yourself into the process
so that you can identify thestrongest concepts, and verify they match your business goals. In addition, as details
including scripting and music selectionare finalized, double check with the agency to make sure all property is
legal and appropriate.

Below is a starting point on a checklist to create and use. To download a blank grid in .xlsx or .pdf format, visit



5. Production
The amount of control you will have over production will depend again on the type of crowdsourcing model
you’re working with. Studies indicate high quality video improves the perception of the brand quality. Therefore,
make sure that the designated production company has solid experience and professionalism.

 Open or contest-based crowdsourcing models. The amount of control is limited in these models. For
instance, for agencies that require crowds to submit videos rather than creative ideas as the first step, you’ll
have little input aside from your creative brief. You have more control over the production process in other
type of open models, though communication with the production company can be limited. The risk of
limited communication can result in an inadequate video; agencies offer the ability to re-shoot and/or edit,
but this can add extra time and costs to your campaign. To minimize these risks,discuss with your agency
how they’ll work to guarantee production quality before you agree to work with them.
 Closed or curated crowdsourcing models. You’ll have the most control over the production process in a
closed model. Open communication channels and the staged approach from ideation to distribution enable
you to be pulsed into the process. In addition, since production companies in a closed model are vetted,
they will be guaranteed to be professionals with strong portfolios. Some agencies recommend you even be
on-set for live action production to serve as the voice of your brand.

6. Distribution- Online, TV, or Both?
It’s important you decide before the project begins where and how you want your video distributed; distribution
should be contingent on what your business goals are, since each channel affects customers in different ways.

Analysis shows (courtesy of Dynamic Logic):
 Repurposed TV ads show higher impact on awareness metrics than made-for-web videos do
 Made-for-web ads show higher purchase intent metrics than repurposed TV ads do
 Purchase intent is particularly high for made-for-web ad online viewers age 18-34
 Purchase intent and brand favorability is significantly higher for women

Here are the types of video contents available and some pros and cons to each:

If you wish to raise metrics across the purchase funnel, you should leverage multiple ad formats.



7. Performance Management and Iteration
The following metrics are broken down by category and can help you organize the specific metrics you wish to
measure for your campaign.To download a blank grid in .xlsx or .pdf format, visit

The metrics are crucial not only to assess performance of the current campaign but to also drive a more focused
strategy towards hitting your target customer in your next campaign.

Paid, Owned, and Earned media
Earned media such as WOM and media buzz is a product of paid and owned media. It’squickly growing in
importance as social networks boom and encourage users to share content. It’s crucial for you to understand
how each of these formsinfluences each other so that you can continue to improve your campaigns. In order to
do this, you’ll need to dig deep into your data. You can take some of the categories above and break out the
analysis according to media form. Examples of questions to evaluate can be:
 Where is your traffic coming from broken out by paid, owned and earned media channels?
 Where are you seeing the strongest funnels and how are they being compounded by the integration of
certain media forms?
 How are conversion rates different based on form of media?
 What drivers are influencing engagement?
 How can you leverage those drivers to further boost engagement and earned media?
From these findings, you can evaluate what worked to help you improve further campaigns and set KPI’s.



Online Video Life Cycle Management
The lifecycle of an online video is short, so you want to plan tactics that can amplify and prolong the life cycle
during each phase. Below are some recommendations on what tactics you can implement during each phase. To
download a lifecycle chart you can edit, visit www.geniusrocket.com/whitepaper.

Development
§ Build up social media excitement prior to launch
Development
Introduction

Growth

Maturity

Decline
§ Consider paid media: Fewer than 0.4% of all YouTube videos ever
break one million views, and often paid media is necessary even for
good branded content to rise above the fold and gain organic views

Introduction
§ Amplify social media messaging and promote sharing
§ Seed the video in channels beyond YouTube, Vimeo that can reach
your target audience
§ Invest in publicity to brew excitement about release
§ Reach out to key in luencers in social media channels and blogs to
view and share video
Views Growth
§ Engage with the audience: Devote the time to search and respond
to relevant user comments
§ Develop new content related to the video (behind the scenes,
interviews, photo releases, etc)

Maturity
§ Start planning next video: The typical YouTube video cycle is short.
New Video Strategy Analysis of the average 90 day viewing lifecycle shows it gets 50%
of its 90 day online view in the 1st 6 day, 75% in the irst 20 days.
The key is to upload content frequently to increase brand lift.

Decline
§ Consider editing video and reuse clips to create a refreshed video
§ If statistics or data are involved and the intention of the video is
long-term, work with production company to update the data
§ Set up Google and social media alerts so when a topic relevant to
your video is mentioned, you can comment and be engaged
Time



In Closing
We hope you’ve found these guidelines resourceful to help ensure you’re excelling in your campaign, especially
if you use a crowdsourcing agency. We encourage any feedback and questions you may have so that we can
continue to improve our guides and resources. E-mail us at hello@geniusrocket.com if you’d like to leave
feedback and/or if you’d like to receive further resources similar to this in the future.

Best of luck as you launch your next video campaign! Whether you choose us or another agency, we are always
available for any questions to help you.

Sincerely,

The Team at GeniusRocket

www.geniusrocket.com

www.facebook.com/geniusrocket
www.twitter.com/geniusrocket
www.vimeo.com/geniusrocket


“GeniusRocket is what an ad agency looks like when it's stripped of
Madison Avenue skyscrapers, high-priced creatives on payroll, sushi
dinners at Nobu, and two-week shoots at the Viceroy in Santa Monica.”


To download an electronic copy, visit www.geniusrocket.com/whitepaper

Strategic guide to Crowdsourcing a Video Marketing Campaign

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Strategic guide to Crowdsourcing a Video Marketing Campaign