Crowdmarketing: the new marketing model

Not only are the media influential anymore; today, people are becoming a medium themselves, and their word-of-mouth recommendations add significant value to brands.

Undoubtedly, the Internet and the Information Age have brought about significant changes in the business model of various industries, leading them to a disruptive phase where the rules of business have changed. The music industry was never the same after Napster arrived: it transitioned from selling tapes or CDs to songs on iTunes for a dollar, and from there to a streaming model with platforms like Spotify. Blockbuster was no longer the same with the advent of the Internet, which facilitated piracy, and subsequently, the streaming model of companies like Netflix, one of the main reasons why Blockbuster has gone bankrupt in the United States. Advertising has not been an exception and has had to evolve thanks to the Internet and the Digital Age.

A few days ago, I was talking to Gerardo Sordo, the founder of BrandMe, named by Forbes as one of the 30 Mexican promises in the world of business. BrandMe is a platform that uses the crowdmarketing model, operating as an online sponsorship marketplace that connects brands with digital content creators with influence on various social networks, where both parties can negotiate the price and content, which can range from a tweet, a YouTube video, an Instagram photo, a Facebook post, or a personal blog. "It all started with a crazy idea of rewarding people for recommending their favorite brands," says Gerardo. They started in 2013, with the Wayra Accelerator, and began operations at the end of 2013, replacing word-of-mouth advertising and product placement with tweet-by-tweet or social media posting advertising, making celebrities and influencers brand ambassadors on social networks. Nowadays, BrandMe helps brands connect with artists such as Katy Perry, Gerard Butler, Adam Levine, Jaime Camil, as well as other 1,000 celebrities, media, and over 30,000 "non-famous" content creators but with a significant social media following. Through their platform, the price is negotiated, with BrandMe recommending a minimum and maximum to pay so that brands can hire them based on their audience and various indicators that analyze how good influencers are.

"Not only are the media influential anymore, but nowadays people are becoming a medium themselves, and their word-of-mouth recommendation adds significant value to brands due to their broad audience and credibility; moreover, influencers have the freedom to recommend brands using their own words and the way they normally communicate to maintain their style and personality," says Gerardo. It's interesting to see how even advertising is seeing changes in its business model by young people proposing revolutionary ideas favored by the Digital Age; moreover, with models like crowdmarketing, the sponsorship model is no longer just from big brands to big artists, but now it can be a small brand paying a celebrity or a big brand paying non-famous influencers to help them viralize their campaigns.