THE EXTRAORDINARIES

ENGAGE SUPPORTERS THROUGH MICRO TASKS

Tools for engaging the communities that you love.

The Extraordinaries is a platform that gives you new ways to engage your community of supporters. People can volunteer on-demand and on-the-spot using a mobile phone or personal computer. It's anytime and anywhere volunteering.

What can micro-volunteers do for you?

You have a community that is passionate about your efforts. We want to help you engage them! For example:

	Translation Problem: Translating text is expensive. With costs around $0.14 per word for Spanish, and as much as $1.50 per word for more exotic languages like Swahili, most organizations struggle to afford it. Solution: In your community, there are people that speak a second language who would love to help you translate. Use The Extraordinaries to reach them in a coordinated, fun, productive, and social experience! How it works: Create a profile and upload a document that you want translated. Our system parses it up into micro work blocks that are uploaded to a mission in your profile, and your supporters begin translating a few sentences at a time. As those sentences are translated, other supporters rate the quality, and through the power of the crowd you get real translations done for a fraction of the cost – and in the process you engaged your community and strengthened your relationship with your supporters.
	Image Tagging Problem: From museums to human rights advocacy groups, environmental policy organizations to universities, we all have photographs. But how do you find the right photo when you need it? It could take hours to dig through directory after directory of images. To have your staff sort through and tag (curate) all those photos can take weeks – and it’s not really the best use of their time. Solution: In your community, there are people that would love to help tag your images. Use The Extraordinaries to reach them in a coordinated, fun, productive, and social experience! How it works: Create a profile on our site, and send us a link to your Flickr photo library. Our system pulls from Flickr’s API and allows your supporters to start adding tags to your Flickr photos, making it ridiculously easy for you to search your Flickr library when you need to find the right photo.
	Investigation or Evidence Collection Problem: You’ve got a big issue to investigate. You’re trying to find illegal dumping sites, map animal abuse cases, identify where the city has been wasting water resources. Problem is, there is no way that your small staff can go out and collect all of that evidence, and there is no easy way for you to ask your supporters to do it. Solution: In your community, there are people that would love to help you collect evidence. Use The Extraordinaries to reach them in a coordinated, fun, productive, and social experience! How it works: Create a profile and put out a request for evidence. Our system instantly puts a camera, GPS, mobile Internet, video player, and keyboard in the hands of your supporters – through phones they already have in their pocket! With one click, you can blast that task to your community, and start collecting real data.
	Citizen Journalism Problem: You’ve got a great idea for a story – or you’re looking for new ones. Problem is, you need help doing the research, or fishing for leads. There is no easy way for you to distribute research tasks to your readers, or ask them for ideas. Some story ideas would take months to research – sorting through mountains of data. That’s just not feasible with current technology. Solution: In your community, there are people that would love to help you research a story – or give you ideas! Use The Extraordinaries to reach them in a coordinated, fun, and productive way. How it works: Create a profile and put out a request for evidence. Our system instantly puts a camera, GPS, mobile Internet, video player, and keyboard in the hands of your supporters – through phones they already have in their pocket! With one click, you can blast that task to your community, and start collecting real data. People can also help you do more detailed research from their computers at home or work.
	Mapping Problem: You need to build a mapped database of playspaces, defibrillators, dog rescues, waste sites, and more. But there is no easy way to do this. Solution: In your community, there are people that would love to help you build your database. Use The Extraordinaries to reach them in a coordinated, fun, productive, and social experience! How it works: Create a profile and build your GPS mapping or tracking task. Our system instantly puts a camera, GPS, mobile Internet, video player, and keyboard in the hands of your supporters. With one click, you can blast that task to your community, and start getting real work done.
	Photography Problem: You need a lot of pictures taken of something. Maybe you are mapping playspaces, defibrillators, dog rescues, or waste sites. Maybe you need a lot of photos of kitchens inside people’s homes. Maybe you need a lot of photos of fire hydrants. Whatever your subject, there is no easy way to manage and collect distributed coordinated photography. Solution: In your community, there are people that would love to help you with your photography needs. Use The Extraordinaries to reach them in a coordinated, fun, productive, and social experience! How it works: Create a profile and build your coordinated photography task. Our system instantly puts a camera, GPS, mobile Internet, video player, and keyboard in the hands of your supporters. With one click, you can blast that task to your community, and start getting real work done.
	Copy Editing Problem: You’ve got a great story to tell, but you’re not quite sure how to frame it. Or, you’ve got 300 families that need a bio written for their micro-finance loan application. Or, you’re looking for a better tag line, and you want some help. Whatever your messaging or narrative needs are, you’re often limited by the creativity of your direct staff or hired consultants. Solution: In your community, there are people that would love to help you strengthen your message, help your write narratives, and more. Use The Extraordinaries to reach them in a coordinated, fun, productive, and social experience! How it works: Create a profile and upload a link, or your material(s). With one click, you can blast that task to your community, and start getting creative content from your supporters.
	Feedback and Critique Problem: You've got a new website, brochure, video, or audio recording. You want to get feedback on it, but surveys or email blasts just aren’t exciting enough. You might even want audio or video feedback to use as sound bites in your podcasts or as other promotional materials. How do you do it? Solution: In your community, there are people that would love to give you feedback, especially if it was a more entertaining user experience than a survey. Use The Extraordinaries to reach them in a coordinated, fun, productive, and social experience! How it works: Create a profile and upload a link, or your material(s). With one click, you can blast that task to your community, and start getting real feedback.

 And much more...

Don't see a micro-action that fits your needs? We can build to suit, and we're brainstorming new actions with our customers every day.  If you're interested in participating, please apply through the link below.  Thanks for your interest in The Extraordinaries!

Apply to join the pilot!

The Extraordinaries is one of the hottest new community engagement tools to emerge this year. Is your organization interested in joining the pilot program? Do you want exclusive access to the latest tools? Apply Now!