Mike Hoefflinger, general manager of Intel’s Partner Marketing Group, says this about the idea: “…Intel is working with ASUS to tap into the creative energy of consumers as they share ideas on designing their ideal PC. Intel is committed to encouraging conversations with consumers and giving people a voice in the design of technology they use every day.”
However, what Mike doesn’t mention is that this initiative doesn’t primarily stem from the idea that crowdsourcing can bring a better PC to the world or that crowds are smarter than Intel or Asus’ experts; it comes from the idea of conversational marketing.
There’s nothing negative about this; in fact, I like seeing smart marketing (as opposed to boring marketing, which happens a lot more often) at play. I remember Dell doing something similar, but I haven’t seen or heard of any palpable results from their initiative. Hopefully, this idea from Intel and Asus will result in an awesome laptop which will, in turn, make companies think hard about the true value of crowdsourcing.