A recent survey of corporate executives found that crowdsourcing--asking customers to provide ideas and help in decision-making--is a highly regarded tool for CSR (corporate social responsibility) efforts.
Of 200 executives polled in the Weber Shandwick Social Impact Survey, 95% said crowdsourcing is "valuable" to their organization's CSR programming.
When asked why crowdsourcing is so valuable for CSR, executives said it:
- Surfaces new perspectives and diverse opinions (36%)
- Builds engagement and relationships with key audiences (25%)
- Invites clients and customers from nontraditional sources to contribute ideas and opinions (22%)
- Brings new energy into the process of generating ideas and content (16%)
Among executives who haven't experimented with crowdsourcing, 55% view it favorably and 43% believe it could be valuable for future CSR efforts.
The survey also explored how executives communicate about their companies' CSR efforts. Seventy-two percent said they have used social media and 59% believe it has had a positive impact on their communications with consumers. Interestingly, those executives consider Facebook most valuable (67%), followed by blogs (60%), LinkedIn (58%), Twitter (46%) and FourSquare (44%).
Overall, they said the value of social media is to:
- Create opportunities for companies to reach broad and diverse audiences (38%)
- Allow companies to connect directly with consumers in low-cost, efficient ways (29%)
- Enable companies to engage specific constituencies with greater ease (11%)
The full survey results are available at the link below.
