Needless to say that crowdsourcing with customers is getting big and that many companies are attempting to emulate lighthouse examples as MyStarbucksIdea and Dell Ideastorm. Obviously this is easier said than done. Many initiatives founder after the initial excitement. What makes MyStarbucksIdea work?

Upon visiting the MyStarbucksIdea site you will see many ideas that have been submitted countless times. And you will see a limited number of ideas that are truly original and potentially valuable. A thought leaps to my mind: Would a two-day brainstorm session with some lead users and experts produce similar results? The crowdsourcing evangelist would say: Ah, but just suppose you would have hit upon that one brilliant idea, why care about all the redundancy? And do not forget, one of the reasons of congregating is the opportunity to bask in the glow of an icon brand. We all love Starbucks and sharing this affection is a primary driver for participating. So…

Okay, I agree with the brand engagement argument. MyStarbucksIdea is a collective brand experience. And it is a crowdsourcing platform for aggregation. To be fair, there is even a remarkable degree of community interaction and validation. In fact, setting up a platform merely for validation and insight mining is a perfectly good reason. The focus on finding THE BIG IDEA distracts attention from what is essentially the primary benefit of many crowdsourcing initiatives.

The reason why StarbucksIdea works is that people allot Starbucks a far bigger brand delivery repertoire than just good coffee. They see Starbucks as a location-based occasion for relaxing and reenergizing, for personal contemplation and social discourse. This mental brand position offers a much wider scope for discussion and idea generation than the average coffee retailer. It allows people to show their expertise in other fields than just coffee.

An icon brand draws huge attraction. The fact that people join in droves does not mean that they duly accept everything Starbucks says or does. On the contrary, aficionados tend to be critical of a brand stepping out of line. They need little prompting however to explore ways how to improve or deepen their Starbucks experience.

The Starbucks case shows us the following critical requirements for successful collective mobilization:
• A strong connection
• A vested interest
• A multilayered product
• A rich situational context
The context criterion cannot be underestimated. A rich yet demarcated context allows people to play a pivotal role in the daily reconstruction of the brand experience. They become actors in a setting where every item, every action, every word contributes to the Starbucks Idea.

The Starbucks case is not easily emulated. Icon brands are by definition exceptional. And even icon brands do not always have a rich context. Take Coca-Cola, the most iconic brand of all. Its context is diffuse, for the simple fact that Coke has always stressed its generic message of being ‘always everywhere’ (No doubt Coke marketers beg to differ..).

For mainstream brands the open call will not work, let alone unleash similar mass following and output. These generic brands are less able to rally their customers around their brand. They often lack a rich context. They need to narrow down the scope of the open call to prevent general disengagement (not for me..). In fact, they need a burning issue to arouse attention. They have to prove much harder that they are truly capable and committed to the outcome of the process.

In other words, crowdsourcing is hardly a free ride. The omnipresence of social media does not entail that your audiences will jump to the opportunity offered. The sobering conclusion is that it takes serious effort to mobilize your audience and spark valuable contributions on a sustainable basis if your name is not Starbucks..