What Happened
Crest is among several brands using a new app named Pay Your Selfie to gather insights on consumer behavior from selfies. The app works by paying users who complete specified “selfie tasks,” such as taking selfies when they are brushing their teeth, eating ice-cream, having a protein bar, or drinking their favorite soda. Users receive anywhere from 20 cents to $1 for each “task” completed. In Crest’s case, the P&G brand asked for selfies taken “while brushing your teeth with your favorite Crest product,” and discovered some interesting findings that will help inform its future marketing efforts.
What Brands Need To Do
As Crest’s testing shows, this Pay Your Selfie app functions as a decentralized, photo-based focus group that grants brands a peek into consumers’ daily lives so they can better understand their customers. Depending on how they phrase the tasks, brands can get insights on how their products are being used, which competitors’ products are getting popular, and other observational insights on consumer behavior.
However, given that the app has attracted only 100,000 users since launching in September, the sample size for most “tasks” is probably not large or diversified enough to replace traditional market research. Until it manages to acquire more active users, this app is best suited as a complementary tool for brands to obtain information that people typically don’t or can’t articulate in focus groups or other traditional research methods.
Source: AdWeek
