You can have a community that never goes near crowdsourcing, but you’ll have a difficult time crowdsourcing without a community. So what’s the difference?

An online community is a group of people that primarily interacts via the internet for social, professional, educational or other purposes. Within online communities people gain recognition and get familiar with each other via profiles, have conversations using tools like chats, forums and walls among other tools. Online communities are the new small towns where people can live in and create trust networks.

Crowdsourcing calls to online communities to pitch in ideas, opinions, or even submitting products or funding – then vote on and rank those contributions to identify the strongest solution.

Comparing the two: a community engages a crowd while crowdsourcing calls to the crowd to contribute.

At the heart of crowdsourcing is the belief that community offers an untapped energy to affect change. Strong online communities create a sense of belonging and interaction for members that is a vital to motivating crowdsourcing. Healthy communities are like a crowd of supporters lined up outside your doors, volunteering up useful information to your company. So why not call to your crowds for contribution?

photo credit: Bill Ruhsam