Blogging Innovation is Moving

by Braden Kelley

Pardon our dust...

Blogging Innovation is moving from the Blogger platform to the Wordpress platform today.

What does this mean for you?

Well, there may be some disruption in the blog. Sometime today you'll see the whole blog switch over, and for a time there may be some broken links. I'll try to fix them all up, but it would be a huge help if people could report any broken links that they find.

RSS subscriptions to our may or may not need to be updated. If you're subscribed to the blog via feedburner, then the switch should be automatic, but if you're subscribed to atom.xml or rss.xml you may have to re-subscribe in the 'Where to Follow Along' section of the sidebar when the new site goes live. I will try to forward the old feed urls to the new ones but I'm not sure whether that will work or not.


The move to Wordpress will have several key benefits:

1. Better searching
   
   • There will be a search box right below the monthly sponsor's logo
   
   
2. Better visibility
   
   • People will finally be able to see that Blogging Innovation has more than 1,100 articles (and growing)
     
   • More content will be exposed on the main page
     
   • Page navigation controls at the bottom of pages will make it possible to see all the articles in a categoy for once
   
   
3. More fun
   
   • People can explore the blog more organically - at random at the bottom if they wish!
     
   • Blogging Innovation v2.0 will feel more alive

So, be on the lookout for Blogging Innovation v2.0 later today, and please let me know what you think.

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Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. Braden is also @innovate on Twitter.

Setting Big Things in Motion

by Braden Kelley

I had the opportunity to attend a Biznik Innovators event featuring John Hagel III (JH) and John Seely Brown (JSB) earlier this week and thought I would bring you some of the highlights and a video interview with John Seely Brown.

Here are some of the key insights:

• Don't focus on employee satisfaction. Often the most passionate people are the most frustrated. In the typical organization about 20% of the employees are passionate and 80% are not. This percentage is inversely correlated with corporation size. - JH


• "Extreme performance only comes from people who are passionate." - JSB


• Compactness Theorem - Kids need to link, then lurk, then join - JSB


• Spikes are places where you have a concentration of people focused on the same thing. When it comes to spikes in today's flat world, you can either go there, or try to pull them to you or pull them together. - JSB


• John Hagel told a story about Chris Anderson, Wired magazine editor and his side-project - Drone aircraft - and how he found a guy to be his CTO who knew more than anyone else about drone aircraft - only to find out he was a 19-year old high school dropout from Tijuana. He never would have found him via a traditional search.


• It would be helpful if we changed education system for the new world, but change can start without it - JH


• John Seely Brown talked about how construction contractors are actually good examples of 'pull' because of the underlying trust networks.


• The process of idea appropriation is very social and the best ideas do not always win. - JSB


• Our identities are shifting from consumption to creation. Who has used what you've created? What have you learned from it? - JH


• It used to be that what was important was 'What I own and control', but now 'I am what I build, share, and what others build on' - JSB


• Firms are focused on scalable efficiencies and need to switch to scalable learning. - JSB


• Handling exceptions is an opportunity for all employees to be creative - JSB


• Passionate people who leave organizations are incredibly important to innovation ecosystems. They often help start the next wave of innovation. - JSB


• 75% of business change initiatives fail. Most that succeed are threat-based. - JH


• Business relationships must create mutual value or they end quickly. - JSB


• You can't control serendipity but you can shape it. - JH

John Seely Brown elaborates on the principles of the book in the embedded video.




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---

Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. Braden is also @innovate on Twitter.

Innovation Perspectives - Social Media is the Glue of Innovation

This is the second of several 'Innovation Perspectives' articles we will publish this week from multiple authors to get different perspectives on 'What is the role of social media in innovation? (Either inside or outside the organization)'. Here is the next perspective in the series:

by Braden Kelley

Social media serves an incredibly important role in innovation. Social media functions as the glue to stick together incomplete knowledge, incomplete ideas, incomplete teams, and incomplete skillsets. Social media is not some mysterious magic box. Ultimately it is a tool that serves to connect people and information.

I'm reminded of a set of lyrics from U2's "The Fly":


"Every artist is a cannibal, every poet is a thief
All kill their inspiration and sing about their grief"


Social media can help ideas grow and thrive that would otherwise wither and die under the boot of the perfectionist in all of us.

Do you remember the saying "it takes a village to raise a child"? Well, it takes a village to create an innovation from an idea as well, and social media helps to aggregate and mobilize the people and knowledge necessary to do just that.

But, that is social media working in the positive. We must remember that social media tools are just that - tools.

Just as easily as social media tools can be an accelerant for innovation, they can also be an inhibitor - if the participants or the presenters manage to make the less active majority feel that innovation is not something for them.

If you don't want to be a fool with a tool, then you must be careful to make sure that the social media tools in your organization are fulfilling their role in a positive way and leveraging existing knowledge management and collaboration toolsets:

1. To make innovative ideas visible and accessible


2. To allow people to have conversations


3. To build community


4. To facilitate information exchange


5. To enable knowledge sharing


6. To assist with expert location


7. To power collaboration on idea evolution


8. To help people educate themselves


9. To connect people to others who share their passion


10. To surface the insights and strategy that people should be building ideas from

The better you become at the above, the stronger your organization's innovation capability will become, the more engaged your employees will become, and the more ready you will become to engage successfully in open innovation.

For the most part, what I've been talking about is the role of social media in innovation inside the organization. When you leverage social media for innovation outside the organization, it gets a whole lot more complicated.

But, maybe that's a conversation for another day.

In the meantime, please consider the ways in which social media in your organization might be able to strengthen inter-disciplinary cooperation, make the organization itself more adaptable, and how it could help to create an organization with the power to transform more ideas into innovations.



You can check out all of the 'Innovation Perspectives' articles from the different contributing authors on 'How should firms develop the organizational structure, culture, and incentives (e.g., for teams) to encourage successful innovation?' by clicking the link in this sentence.

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Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. Braden is also @innovate on Twitter.

Reminder - Innovation Perspectives Due Midnight April 24

Just a reminder that you still have a chance to add your voice to April's Innovation Perspectives.

This monthly feature presents our loyal readers with different perspectives on a single topic all in one place - from several different authors. It gives our innovation community the opportunity to compare, contrast and discuss them in the comments here on Blogging Innovation and with the 2,750+ people in the Continuous Innovation group on LinkedIn.

Here is this month's topic for publishing the week of April 26-May 2, 2010:


What is the role of social media in innovation? (Either inside or outside the organization)

• Thank you to Brightidea for sponsoring Blogging Innovation this month. Find out more about Brightidea here.


• The submission deadline is midnight GMT on April 24, 2010

Several contributing authors will be writing articles on this topic, but you are also welcome to submit an article. The process is simple:

1. Submit your article using our contact form


2. I will e-mail you back with a request for a 1-2 sentence author byline and a photo like those on Blogging Innovation

We look forward to sharing April's Innovation Perspectives with you and hearing your thoughts!


If you missed March's Innovation Perspectives, you can find them here.

---

Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. Braden is also @innovate on Twitter.

Save up to $350 on Business Innovation Factory (BIF-6) Tickets

by Braden Kelley

Business Innovation Factory (BIF-6) will be held September 15-16, 2010 in Providence, Rhode Island.

There are only 300 seats for this fun and interesting event and it generally sells out.

As an added value to our loyal readers, we have negotiated a $50 discount when you register using the discount code - bk10.


Anyways, this year's storytelling lineup includes:

• Tony Hsieh - CEO of Zappos.com


• Jason Fried - Founder of 37signals.com


• John Maeda - President of the Rhode Island School of Design


• Don Tapscott - Author "Rebuilding the World"


• Alan Webber - Author and Co-Founder of Fast Company magazine


• Rita King - Innovator-in-Residence at IBM's Analytics Virtual Center

Save up to $350 until June 2, 2010 - $1,150 per ticket when you register with discount code bk10 - instead of $1,500.


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Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. Braden is also @innovate on Twitter.

Storytelling in Social Media

TEDx Seattle Interview with Elan Lee, Founder of Fourth Wall Studios

by Braden Kelley

I had the opportunity to interview Elan Lee, Founder and Chief Designer at Fourth Wall Studios, at TEDx Seattle recently. In this video Elan talks about the future of storytelling and the importance of storytelling to conveying information to others about your new ideas or innovations.





Some of you may be familiar with Elan Lee's work on the alternate reality game "Year Zero" for the promotion of Nine Inch Nail's "Year Zero" album. This project won a Cannes Lion Grand Prix award and a Clio Award (Bronze). Here is an excerpt from the "Promotion" section of the "Year Zero" album's Wikipedia entry:

In an interview with Kerrang! magazine, Reznor hinted that the album was "part of a bigger picture of a number of things I'm working on".[3] In February 2007 fans discovered that a new Nine Inch Nails tour t-shirt contained highlighted letters that spelled out the words "I am trying to believe".[2] This phrase was registered as a website URL, and soon several related websites were also discovered in the IP range, all describing a dystopian vision of the fictional "year 0000".[2] It was later reported that 42 Entertainment had created these websites to promote Year Zero as part of an alternate reality game.[8]

The Year Zero story takes place in the United States in the year 2022; or "Year 0" according to the American government, being the year that America was reborn. The United States has suffered several major terrorist attacks, and in response the government has seized absolute control on the country and reverted to a Christian fundamentalist theocracy. The government maintains control of the populace through institutions such as the Bureau of Morality and the First Evangelical Church of Plano, as well as increased surveillance and the secret drugging of tap water with a mild sedative. In response to the increasing oppression of the government, several corporate, government, and subversive websites were transported back in time to the present by a group of scientists working clandestinely against the authoritarian government. The websites-from-the-future were sent to the year 2007 to warn the American people of the impending dystopian future and to prevent it from ever forming in the first place.[9]

The Year Zero game consisted of series of websites, phone numbers, e-mails, videos, MP3s, murals, and other media that expanded upon the fictional storyline of the album. Each new piece of media contained various hints and clues to discover the next, relying on fan participation to discover each new facet of the expanding game. Rolling Stone described the fan involvement in this promotion as the "marketing team's dream".[10] Reznor, however, argued that "marketing" was an inaccurate description of the game, and that it was "not some kind of gimmick to get you to buy a record - it IS the art form".[11]

This gives you a good idea of the type of storytelling that Elan Lee does. For more of the story about how the "Year Zero" game played out, see the rest of the "Promotion" section of the Wikipedia entry on the album.

I would love to hear your thoughts about how storytelling will evolve as an art form as the internet and mobile devices gain new capabilities. Sound off in the comments!


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---

Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. Braden is also @innovate on Twitter.

Are you LinkedIn to innovation?

For those of you who may not be aware or who are not already members, the Continuous Innovation group on LinkedIn is where a lot of the discussions and innovation article sharing happens amongst the readers of this blog.

Our LinkedIn community has over 2,700 members and is growing fast.

Come join us and add your voice to the conversation!


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---

Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. Braden is also @innovate on Twitter.

Ten Innovation Imperatives

Interview - Robert F. Brands

I had the opportunity to interview Robert F. Brands, author of "Robert's Rules of Innovation" recently.

Here is the text of the interview:

1. When it comes to innovation, what is the biggest challenge that you see organizations facing?

The first and most important challenge is to understand and realize that innovation is not optional, it really is : Innovate or Perish. As a result of the traditional product lifecycle it is a phenomenon that once past the "growth" and "mature" phase, any product or service will ultimately decline. So for any thriving business one has to reinvent itself and add new products or services over and over. Once convinced of the importance, it all starts with the leadership. The CEO supported by the leadership team has to create a vision mission and strategy that is all in support of and in line with the innovation efforts. As a result resources would be budgeted, measurements and reward systems created. It has to be a holistic approach since no individual elements like just having a new product development process or great ideation will ultimately create sustainable innovation. The larger the organization the bigger the challenges and the most important tip is to have a simple and clearly stated innovation objective so that all involved will work towards the same objective, this can be as simple as "one new product per year".


2. For you, where does innovation begin?

Innovation begins with the Chief Executive Officer who has to be the Chief Innovation Officer. His or her vision, mission and strategy supported by the executive leadership team is really where it all begins but the most important first step is for any organization to define innovation so that everybody is on the same page.


3. Are there any of the ten innovation imperatives that are more important than the others?

To create truly sustainable innovation, no imperative is more important than the other. However it is essential to have a solid New Product Development process as well as Ideation process in place since both will create, feed and guide the product concepts through the organization.


4. What are some of the most important parts of an innovation culture that must be maintained for innovation to be sustainable?

Inspiration is one of the most difficult elements of the innovation efforts to maintain according to a recent survey by InnovationCoach.com. This is kind of a surprise as it is the chief executive that should continue to inspire, stay focused and involved. In looking at the parts to make this happen, communication is absolutely key. It is really important to share with the organization as a whole the intend, the goal and the focus and as a result one should communicate on a regular basis to share the initial victories and wins, challenges and focus. The second element that comes to mind is "Openness" of Innovation; start internally, eliminate silos and the anti-bodies and cooperate to win. This will create an environment where by Open Innovation from the outside can be accepted and welcomed which can help you accelerate your efforts.


5. Why are patents and the new product development process so important to innovation?

The book spends a complete chapter on the importance of intellectual property and patents and how to go about it. Patents are important since they create protection and allow a greater return on investment, it helps you carve out a specific proprietary area of protection that can help you build market share and create stakeholder value. It is proven that those companies with a strong patent portfolio creates much more value to their stakeholders than companies without. Airspray, the case study focused on in the book (the company that brought instant foaming dispensers like hand soap to market) was sold at 15 times EBIT which proves the point.

The New Product Development process helps you take a product or service from concept to launch. It enables you to do multiple tasks, simultaneously, by different departments, so that all elements come to completion and fruition at the same end date. This can be done by way of a simple matrix or complex detailed process but it is essential to prioritize and track the concepts through the process and have clear go/no-go stage-gates with teeth.


6. If you were to change one thing about our educational system to better prepare students to contribute in the innovation workforce of tomorrow, what would it be?

Making sure that the innovators of tomorrow are skilled in project management, ideation, and teamwork. Leadership will come naturally to those able, but regardless of whether you are a leader or contributor these three skills are essential to cooperate and deliver the new products and services of tomorrow.


You'll find our book review of Robert F. Brands' book "Robert's Rules of Innovation" here.


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---

Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. Braden is also @innovate on Twitter.

Book Review - "Robert's Rules of Innovation"

by Braden Kelley

A few weeks ago I received "Robert's Rules of Innovation" by Robert F. Brands with Martin J. Kleinman in the mail. "Robert's Rules of Innovation" is an approachable 200 pages, and is an easy, and pleasant read.

Robert F. Brands is a consultant, speaker, contributor to Blogging Innovation, and former CEO of Airspray N.V. - manufacturer of the ubiquitous foaming pumps on soaps of all kinds.

The book lays out a self-described 10-step program for corporate survival as a set of ten 'innovation imperatives' that are as follows:

1. Inspire
   
2. No Risk, No Innovation
   
3. New Product Development Process
   
4. Ownership
   
5. Value Creation
   
6. Accountability
   
7. Training and Coaching
   
8. Idea Management
   
9. Observe and Measure
   
10. Net Result and Reward

The book highlights the importance of an innovation audit before your innovation efforts begin, and includes sample innovation audit questions in the book and a more complete version is available on the supporting web site.

If new product development processes have not been formalized sufficiently in your company, the book devotes a significant portion of the text and appendices to new product development process flow charts and other resources and information.

There are many different definitions and quotes about innovation and there is one mentioned from Bruce Sauter in the book that is an interesting one to think about:


"Innovation is a holistic strategy for building organizational culture, empowering the passion to create, developing creative environments that can execute effectively, and creating the potential for market leadership. Innovation is not just happening in the front end of the business development process - it needs to be pervasive throughout the entire value chain."


Robert reinforces more than once in the book the importance of the CEO to innovation. In fact you might infer his perspective to be that the Chief Executive Officer should be the Chief Innovation Officer for innovation to be successful.

At the same time, numerous pages are allocated to the subject of teamwork and the delicate tension between giving "creatives" enough separation to have freedom to create and feel safe to push the boundaries of failure, without separating them too far so that resentment builds or the engagement of other employees falls.

Taken all together I found "Robert's Rules of Innovation" to present a clear approach to innovation for managers looking to begin their innovation journey or for people looking to read up a bit more on the topic.


Please also see our interview with Robert F. Brands.


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---

Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. Braden is also @innovate on Twitter.

World Innovation Forum Contest Winners Announced

Seventeen people answered all five scavenger hunt questions to enter the contest and have a chance to win some great prizes including a free ticket to the World Innovation Forum in New York, NY on June 8-9, 2010. This is a $2,200 ticket to an event that often sells out.


Here are the winners as drawn randomly by my five-year-old out of a hat:

1. (1) complimentary admission (a $2,200 value) to the World Innovation Forum


• Mauricio Bastos of Brazil


2. (1) complimentary admission ($99 value) to a Seth Godin webinar on April 15, 2010


• Matt Podgorski of Germany


3. (1) HSM DVD on Innovation from HSM's DVD Master Series (a $79 value)


• Jim Sabogal of Pennsylvania


4. (2) signed copies of Robert F Brand's new book "Robert's Rules of Innovation"


• Shawna O'Reilly of Minnesota


• Karen Pineda of New York

Thank you to everyone who participated!


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---

Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. Braden is also @innovate on Twitter.

World Innovation Forum Scavenger Challenge #5

Here is the fifth of five scavenger hunt questions to answer on your way to a chance to win some great prizes including a free ticket to the World Innovation Forum in New York, NY on June 8-9, 2010. This is a $2,200 ticket to an event that often sells out.

For more details on the contest - please see the contest announcement.

All questions are easily answerable with Bing, Yahoo!, Ask Jeeves, or your favorite lesser-known search engine.


World Innovation Forum Scavenger Challenge #5 (5 of 5):

Robert F Brands, author of "Robert's Rules of Innovation":

• Was the CEO of what company?
  
• This company is responsible for what popular cleaning product?

If you missed the first four questions, you can access them here:

1. Challenge Question #1
   
2. Challenge Question #2
   
3. Challenge Question #3
   
4. Challenge Question #4

CONTEST IS NOW CLOSED - ended at midnight GMT on April 13, 2010.


As a reminder, the following prizes are up for grabs:

1. (1) complimentary admission (a $2,200 value) to the World Innovation Forum


2. (1) complimentary admission ($99 value) to a Seth Godin webinar on April 15, 2010


3. (1) HSM DVD on Innovation from HSM's DVD Master Series (a $79 value)


4. (2) signed copies of Robert F Brand's new book "Robert's Rules of Innovation"

Don't miss an article - Subscribe to our RSS feed or join us on Facebook or LinkedIn!

---

Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. Braden is also @innovate on Twitter.

Call for April 'Innovation Perspectives'

April's opportunity to contribute your Innovation Perspectives is now here.

This monthly feature presents our loyal readers with different perspectives on a single topic all in one place - from several different authors. It gives our innovation community the opportunity to compare, contrast and discuss them in the comments here on Blogging Innovation and with the 2,500+ people in the Continuous Innovation group on LinkedIn.

Here is this month's topic for publishing the week of April 26-May 2, 2010:


What is the role of social media in innovation? (Either inside or outside the organization)

• Thank you to Brightidea for sponsoring Blogging Innovation this month. Find out more about Brightidea here.


• The submission deadline is midnight GMT on April 24, 2010

Several contributing authors will be writing articles on this topic, but you are also welcome to submit an article. The process is simple:

1. Submit your article using our contact form


2. I will e-mail you back with a request for a 1-2 sentence author byline and a photo like those on Blogging Innovation

We look forward to sharing April's Innovation Perspectives with you and hearing your thoughts!


If you missed March's Innovation Perspectives, you can find them here.

---

Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. Braden is also @innovate on Twitter.

World Innovation Forum Scavenger Challenge #4

Here is the fourth of five scavenger hunt questions to answer on your way to a chance to win some great prizes including a free ticket to the World Innovation Forum in New York, NY on June 8-9, 2010. This is a $2,200 ticket to an event that often sells out.

For more details on the contest - please see the contest announcement.

All questions are easily answerable with Bing, Yahoo!, Ask Jeeves, or your favorite lesser-known search engine.


World Innovation Forum Scavenger Challenge #4 (4 of 5):

John Wiley & Sons is publishing a book from Braden Kelley in Fall 2010, is it about:

• Basketball?
  
• Naval History?
  
• Barriers to Innovation?
  
• Collaboration?

Collect your answers to all five challenges and submit them via e-mail by midnight GMT April 13, 2010 to scavenger [at] blogginginnovation [dot] com along with your e-mail, address and phone number (so we can contact you or ship you your prize).


Don't miss an article - Subscribe to our RSS feed or join us on Facebook or LinkedIn!

---

Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. Braden is also @innovate on Twitter.

World Innovation Forum Scavenger Challenge #3

Here is the third of five scavenger hunt questions to answer on your way to a chance to win some great prizes including a free ticket to the World Innovation Forum in New York, NY on June 8-9, 2010. This is a $2,200 ticket to an event that often sells out.

For more details on the contest - please see the contest announcement.

All questions are easily answerable with Bing, Yahoo!, Ask Jeeves, or your favorite lesser-known search engine.


World Innovation Forum Scavenger Challenge #3 (3 of 5):

World Innovation Forum 2010 speaker Chip Heath has two books out with common household items on the cover:

• What is household item #1?
  
• What is household item #2?

Collect your answers to all five challenges and submit them via e-mail by midnight GMT April 13, 2010 to scavenger [at] blogginginnovation [dot] com along with your e-mail, address and phone number (so we can contact you or ship you your prize).


Don't miss an article - Subscribe to our RSS feed or join us on Facebook or LinkedIn!

---

Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. Braden is also @innovate on Twitter.

World Innovation Forum Scavenger Challenge #2

Here is the second of five scavenger hunt questions to answer on your way to a chance to win some great prizes including a free ticket to the World Innovation Forum in New York, NY on June 8-9, 2010. This is a $2,200 ticket to an event that often sells out.

For more details on the contest - please see the contest announcement.

All questions are easily answerable with Bing, Yahoo!, Ask Jeeves, or your favorite lesser-known search engine.


World Innovation Forum Scavenger Challenge #2 (2 of 5):

Which person has Braden Kelley not done a video interview with:

• Dean Kamen
  
• Gary Hamel
  
• Dan Pink
  
• Judy Estrin
  
• John Hagel III

Collect your answers to all five challenges and submit them via e-mail by midnight GMT April 13, 2010 to scavenger [at] blogginginnovation [dot] com along with your e-mail, address and phone number (so we can contact you or ship you your prize).


Don't miss an article - Subscribe to our RSS feed or join us on Facebook or LinkedIn!

---

Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. Braden is also @innovate on Twitter.

World Innovation Forum Scavenger Challenge #1

Here is the first of five scavenger hunt questions to answer on your way to a chance to win some great prizes including a free ticket to the World Innovation Forum in New York, NY on June 8-9, 2010. This is a $2,200 ticket to an event that often sells out.

For more details on the contest - please see the contest announcement.

All questions are easily answerable with Bing, Yahoo!, Ask Jeeves, or your favorite lesser-known search engine.


World Innovation Forum Scavenger Challenge #1 (1 of 5):

One of Seth Godin's first books had a colorful animal in the title:

• What kind of animal was it?
  
• What color was it?

Collect your answers to all five challenges and submit them via e-mail by midnight GMT April 13, 2010 to scavenger [at] blogginginnovation [dot] com along with your e-mail, address and phone number (so we can contact you or ship you your prize).


Don't miss an article - Subscribe to our RSS feed or join us on Facebook or LinkedIn!

---

Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. Braden is also @innovate on Twitter.

Chance to Win a Free Ticket to World Innovation Forum

Here is your chance to win some great prizes including a free ticket to the World Innovation Forum in New York, NY on June 8-9, 2010. This is a $2,200 ticket to an event that often sells out.

This year's World Innovation Forum lineup includes:

• Seth Godin, Michael Porter, Chip Heath, Biz Stone, and more.

So, how can you enter to win?


Simple. We're having a five item innovation scavenger hunt.


Starting tomorrow, each day from April 9-13, 2010 we will post a new question (five in total) that can be answered quickly from information publicly available on the internet. Individuals who answer all five questions correctly will be entered in random draw for the following prizes:

1. (1) complimentary admission (a $2,200 value) to the World Innovation Forum


2. (1) complimentary admission ($99 value) to a Seth Godin webinar on April 15, 2010


3. (1) HSM DVD on Innovation from HSM's DVD Master Series (a $79 value)


4. (2) signed copies of Robert F Brand's new book "Robert's Rules of Innovation"

In the event that not enough people get all five questions correct we will progressively draw from the groups of four correct answers, three correct answers, etc. until all five prizes are given away.

1. Challenge Question #1
   
2. Challenge Question #2
   
3. Challenge Question #3
   
4. Challenge Question #4
   
5. Challenge Question #5

You only have until midnight GMT April 13, 2010 to submit your entries by email to scavenger [at] blogginginnovation [dot] com.


Or, if you would like to skip the contest and attend the World Innovation Forum, we have negotiated a $200 discount for our loyal readers when you register with our discount code "INNOVATE".


Editors's notes: The winner of the one (1) World Innovation Forum ticket is still responsible for covering their own travel costs. The prizes for this contest are being provided by HSM Global and Robert F Brands, not Blogging Innovation, and are conveyed at their discretion not ours.


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---

Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. Braden is also @innovate on Twitter.