• by Richard Whitman , Columnist, July 31, 2016

Not surprisingly, every last witty wordplay on "crowd" and "crowdsourcing" has already been plundered by overeager startups that think just because they slap the word "crowd" on their Web site, they miraculously transform into something that has never before been offered. That hasn't stopped a French freelance marketplace that has dubbed its new offering Krawd. 

Yeah, Krawd. Which sounds like some sort of overcrowded crawfish farm with each and every crawfish doing their damnedest to climb up and over all the other crawfish so they can be on top. Oh wait, that name is perfect. After all, that's exactly what everyone in advertising does: use others as stepping stones to their own success. 

OK, back to Krawd, the French startup. The company claims to have developed something completely new, rethinking how agencies work. How has Krawd rethought the way agencies work?  Wait for it... The company has built a marketplace of freelancers which agencies can tap for talent when needed. Yeah, that's never been done before. 

Krawd claims to be different because they "carefully review" each freelancer's application to the network to insure that only the best become part of the offering to agencies. And, of course, it's an app as well which, you know, makes it super cool. 

Krawd also has a Q and A process that those interested in a freelancer go through that is said to ensure great matches versus the usual process of sifting through thousands of online portfolios. Moving forward, Krawd will offer up a set of images designed to present creative directions based upon the questions answered. In other words, it's sort of a "did you mean something like this" process. Of course, that's really the worst way to begin a creative process, but for this sort of cookie cutter approach to things, hey, maybe it will work. 

The company, just a couple of months old, says it has managed 50 projects so far with each of the projects billing out at about $4,000. Peanuts for now.