Q&A: Gigwalk Co-Founder Says CPGs Need Data in Real Time

Matt Crampton is co-founder and chief technology officer of Gigwalk, a San Francisco-based digital workforce management platform that pays people to use its mobile app to complete straightforward marketing tasks.

Businesses can contract with Gigwalk to receive data generated by “Gigwalkers” so they can better understand and grow their businesses.

Crampton was recently in Northwest Arkansas, taping for “Focus on Suppliers,” and during that time he granted an interview with the Northwest Arkansas Business Journal.

The conversation was both lively and thought-provoking.

You’ve had a distinguished career in IT for companies like Yahoo! and AOL. What gave you the idea to start Gigwalk?

“I was working at Yahoo! with a team of three on local searches. We realized restaurants were a problem because 10 percent of them go out of business every month. It’s hard to maintain accurate data about a business category with a stat like that.

“Concurrently, our team recognized that people were starting to really use their smartphones. We thought, why not get people to use their phones to get up-to-the-minute information?

“At first we wondered if we actually could get people to use their phones to gather information and do work. We posted on Craigslist for people to use their phones to check the cleanliness of bathrooms in a chain of coffee stores. We got huge amounts of data for a small amount of money. People went beyond doing what we asked for the job. They would send us 20 photos, their resume, extra information. They felt like they were doing something important.

“We were unusual in that we built a working product and had customers before we sought funding.”

Gigwalk’s workforce is composed of smartphone users who perform simple tasks, such as taking pictures of a store or a display. How does this work by a team of freelancers benefit consumer packaged goods companies?

“Suppliers need information in real time. They have to know what’s really happening with their brands — promotional signage, in stock, in-store events.

“Did that person really show up in the store and pass out the candy as you wanted? They need to know.

“Originally, we wondered how complex we could make the work. As soon as we put technology in place to evaluate our Gigwalkers, we knew we could give many of them more complex jobs. We thought we’d be hiring students needing beer money, but we found we were hiring off-duty military folks, teachers, real estate agents — people with flexible schedules who were looking for a second paycheck, money to take care of that vacation or a kid’s braces.”

Are CPG companies making good use of the tremendous amount of data that is now available to them? Do you think that some people in the CPG industry are intimidated by data?

“People are intimidated by data, in part because data doesn’t lie. With Gigwalk, you have an independent person checking on things. Everything is time-stamped and geo-stamped. Accountability falls into place.

“Now, we also have Gigwalk Enterprises. With that, a company uses our technology in a private way.

Crossmark, the largest retail merchandiser in the country, uses our technology, for example, and manages a large group of people with it.”