The startup that will make you look popular

Much attention has been bestowed upon the growing republican field as the clock winds down on next year’s primary elections. Part of the strategy of these campaigners has been their announcements. For example, Ben Carson announced his candidacy in a dramatic, Jobs-esque montage, which compared the surgeon to former leaders such as Martin Luther King, Jr. and Abraham Lincoln. On the same day, Carly Fiorina announced her candidacy in a decidedly more modest fashion. Other candidates have given similar speeches in efforts to create a sort of tone and framework for their presidential campaign. Each of these announcements has been scrutinized by analysts trying to determine what each of these announcements mean for each candidate. Yet still the first prerequisite of each of these announcements is a cheering crowd. Crowds are important for a candidate because, more than anything, they provide the illusion that these candidates are likable and popular, which oftentimes is as important as actually being likable and popular. Crowds on Demand is a service that caters to those who lack the human resources for an actual crowd, but have the capital resources for the aforementioned illusory crowd. 

Crowds on Demand literally offers a crowd on demand. Let us say that you need to drum up some support for a rally that you plan on hosting. Getting people to actually want to rally for your cause is a difficult task and carries with it some tough stipulations. Instead, you could just hire Crowds on Demand, who will send a troupe of their experienced, professional actors to cheer you on at your rally, speech, slam poetry reading, etc. Becoming one of these actors seems easy enough; the link to join the ranks of these clapping mercenaries is right on the front page of the service’s website. Crowds on Demand is also not the only company to offer this type of service – according to certain business insiders, Donald Trump hired a service called Extra Mile to applaud his recent presidential announcement (the Trump camp has later refuted this accusation).

There is a comedic value to the whole concept of Crowds on Demand, yet it is difficult at first to pin down what makes this service so funny. Perhaps it is the fact that the service takes such a traditional civil institution, like applauding and cheering for others, and monetizes it with a complete lack of self-awareness. The fact that one would need to commoditize this type of normal interaction should be embarrassing to those who would use this type of service, yet its popularity is still apparent. That explains why Trump was so quick to deny the use of such a service for his own announcement – a presidential candidate should not need to buy supporters. The obvious comparison that comes to my mind is online dating websites – instead of going through the actual trouble of going out and meeting people, people can pay a fee and automatically be connected to those who best match their profile. As useful as these websites are, many people are not particularly open to using them for reasons of pride alone. 

Despite all this, anybody looking to venture into the start-up world can take some very simple lessons from this company’s success. The first takeaway would be that, given the communication afforded to us by the Internet, it is truly possible to commoditize anything. It is easy to mock the concept, but it addresses a real need and finds a way to get it to people more easily. The need it is addressing, a crowd, is not some sort of revolutionary idea – in fact its one that requires almost no training and little effort. Personally, I think the more fluid hiring model used by Uber could be tremendously useful for this website in order to expand its service. By taking an existing service and making the exchange of it more convenient, start-ups can find success without really having to innovate or create anything new.