Chevrolet is offering a bounty of US$7500 (about R57 500) for the individual with the best idea. Once the client has chosen and awarded the winning TV script, it will be handed over to MOFILM who will then recruit their most successful crowd sourced TV director to create the commercial in conjunction with producer Jon Landau.
According to Jeff Howe, author of Crowdsourcing - Why the Power of the Crowd is Driving the Future of Business, "Crowdsourcing activates the transformative power of today's technology, liberating the latent potential within us all".
"It's a perfect meritocracy, where age, gender, race, education and job history no longer matter; the quality of work is all that counts; and every field is open to people of every imaginable background," Howe writes. "If you can perform the service, design the product, or solve the problem, you've got the job."
Idea Bounty, founded by Cape Town digital advertising and marketing agency Quirk, employs crowdsourcing to address briefs submitted by big businesses.
Companies approach Idea Bounty with a specific marketing problem they need solved. Idea Bounty then produces a brief, which it publishes to the Web, soliciting ideas from people around the world. The best ideas are then scrutinised by Idea Bounty's clients, and the best idea is then paid a bounty, or fee.
Chevrolet now offers a full range of cars across all size categories, designed with European customers in mind and the advert must therefore work to challenge notions of Chevrolet being about big, fuel-guzzling American cars and showcase the full portfolio of new cars that Chevrolet is bringing to market this year.
Daniel Neville, MD at Idea Bounty says, "Most of the ideas we receive are no longer than an A4 page and we get input from everyone from students to stay-at-home moms, but most often from people who work in ad agencies and PR companies," Neville says, "What we are looking for are those fresh ideas that you find in the strangest places."
To participate, simply register on www.ideabounty.com, read more about the brief, and send in your most original idea.
