Quick Take Review: Crowdsourcing with Kluster

By David Dahlquist Jun 11, 2008

kluster quick take review, crowdsourcing

Kluster is an online collaboration and decision-making platform that takes the crowdsourcing concept to a new level by including a system of incentives to encourage user participation.

The Brainchild of young entrepreneur, Ben Kaufman, who got his start in the iPod accessory industry, Kluster has the potential to redefine not only the crowdsourcing industry, but the way people think about project management and production.

Kluster Basics

Vendor Name: Kluster

Product Category: Online collaboration and decision-making platform.

Typical Scenario: : The underlying theme of Kluster is that development and decision-making are better served by engaged groups. Unlike project management services like Basecamp that let you assemble your own team to work on projects, Kluster enables consumer influence across organizations worldwide. The entire Kluster community is a potential resource for your project.

Company & Product History

Kluster was founded by Ben Kaufman, a 21 year old entrepreneur from Burlington, Vermont who at the tender age of 18 got his start selling iPod accessories through his company Mophie. Mophie let consumers and retailers participate in product design and development. This community driven philosophy proved effective, as Mophie products ended up being sold in outlets in 28 countries.

Mophie's most popular product is the Bevy, an all-in-one iPod Shuffle case, bottle opener, cord-wrap, and keychain. It was designed at last year’s MacWorld conference in 72 hours with input from 30,000 customers using software that served as a precursor to Kluster.

Mophie was acquired by mStation in August 2007, and the undisclosed proceeds of the sale were invested in Kluster, as was US$1 mil. from Village Ventures. Ben Kaufman saw potential in the collaborative method through which the Mophie was created, and is trying to recreate the collaborative community environment with Kluster.

The Kluster public beta launched in February 19, 2008, and is still in beta phase at this time.

Market & Pricing

The target market for Kluster is huge. The founder's ambition is to cater to anyone interested in working with any number of projects, from marketing and logo design, to creating a product from the ground up. Anybody with an idea and a group of users is a potential customer.

Price Range: Kluster is free to join, but if you’re a company interested in benefiting from the community, it is helpful to have cash to offer for a winning idea.

Typical Deal Price: Various organizations offer rewards that range from non-existent, to tens of thousands of dollars for winning ideas.

Business Model: Kluster’s business model revolves around them taking a cut of a company’s reward price; a brokerage fee, if you will. 15% of every transaction goes to Kluster. While public projects are hosted for free, if a company wishes to run a crowdsourcing session for a private group, Kluster charges a separate fee based on the number of participants.

A Typical Usage Scenario

Kluster takes the idea of crowdsourcing — think Wikipedia for businesses — and adds a market-like incentive to motivate contributers into collaborating. Kluster has its own economy; the currency is called Watts.

In a typical usage scenario, a company offers a certain reward, generally a cash prize for a certain aspect of development they would like the Kluster community to assist them with — say, a logo design. A few graphically inclined members might upload some images, and individual Kluster members then invest their Watts in the image they feel is best suited for the company. They can also make suggestions for improvements or upload a variation of the logo.