Experimenting with an online collaboration panel

Marketers all over the world are debating, re-thinking and identifying more effective ways of gathering consumer insights on an on-going basis, instead of using traditional research methods that gather input at specific moments of the marketing process.  About a year ago, inspired by a conversation with some people at IBM Brazil on the boom of web 2.0, I came back to the office and asked my team how we could adopt a more collaborative approach to brand management using the learnings from social networks.  Millenials already use social networks to interact on an infinite number of themes from the indie rock scene, to what's hot in tech gadgets, to discussion boards on video-gaming.  

Could we create a social network-type environment with college kids that have an interest for marketing to help us craft the future of our brands that target Brazilian millenials?

After talking to one of the country's hottest consumer research company, we found out the answer was yes.  Last month we launched an exciting initiative that has the potential of transforming the way we engage with one of our toughest demographics.  We put together an online consumer panel with 40 college students from around the country, carefully selected.  It has been an amazing lab into better understanding how these kids react to the weekly brand stimulus we post for their evaluation.  A much deeper and engaging experience versus focus groups or qual studies.