If you’ve got a great idea for a product, chances are, you lack the know-how and/or the opportunity to get it off the ground. Not to mention, the capital to build and market the darn thing.

Try listing your idea on Quirky instead.  Quirky is a product development community run by the same guys behind Name This (which we discussed in Hot Pockets).   Each week, inventors submit their product ideas in a competition.  There is a $99 entrance fee, but hear the pitch out:  The Quirky community (a.k.a. Influencers) votes on the best idea, which will then be turned into a real product with the help of the community.   In other words, Quirky takes your concept and sees it through the entire product development life cycle – design, protyping, branding, manufacturing, marketing, and sales.

Like Name This, Quirky offers everyone in the community a stake in the product. Influencers invest points in different ideas and receive payouts when their horse comes in first, which is motivation to keep them interested and active in the crowdsourcing process.   When a product reaches market, Quirky returns $.30 of every dollar sold to the participants involved ($.12 to the actual inventor).   While this may seem like highway robbery to someone not familiar with the benefits of crowdsourcing  – or fiercely protective of their idea – a $99 investment sees your product come to life, gives you invaluable market research and feedback during its design, and then provides a venue for sales (Quirky actually sells the products on their site).

If your idea isn’t chosen by the Quirky community, you are still provided with the demographic data of the community that reviewed your product.   This is valuable information that you can then use to improve your product idea or zero in on a target market.