From customers for customers: Crowd services as an extension of the digital customer experience
Journal
HMD Praxis der Wirtschaftsinformatik
ISSN
2198-2775
ISSN-Digital
1436-3011
Date Issued
2017-08-17
Author(s)
Research Team
IWI6
Abstract
The “Platform Economy” is currently changing the way how work is performed. Particularly, crowdworking platforms have gained momentum during the last years. By now, they can be used by companies for a wide range of activities along their value chain. One example is the customer support that increasingly gains importance given the more and more complex end products. Based on the crowdworking platform Mila and its client and 51-percent owner Swisscom AG, we demonstrate how companies that use the crowd extend their digital interface to the customer and expand their services, generating an added value for all those involved. With its innovative approach, the crowdworking platform Mila connects the paradigm of the crowd, particularly the utilization of a variety of providers, with the principles of the On Demand- and Sharing Economy, primarily the inclusion of the customers as service “producers”. Similarly to well-known platform-based examples of the Sharing Economy such as Airbnb and Uber, the initiation of work and the customer interface is shaped in a digital way, though the work itself is then usually performed directly on site at the customer’s. Based on in-depth expert interviews with those responsible of Mila and Swisscom, we analyze this new kind of work system including the interplay of all participants. Subsequently, we show advantages and disadvantages of using crowd services and derive concrete recommendations of action for companies for the design of the digital customer interface.
Language
German
Keywords
Crowdsourcing
Crowdworking platforms
Crowd services
Crowd work
Digital customer interface
On demand ecomomy
HSG Classification
contribution to scientific community
Refereed
Yes
Volume
54
Number
5
Start page
821
End page
837
Pages
17
Subject(s)
Division(s)
Eprints ID
269501
File(s)![Thumbnail Image]()
open.access
Name
JML_644_en.pdf
Size
1.87 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
8271960a3b7059636e80ab6b1222309c