Enhancing The Open Model Through The Use of Community

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Enhancing The Open Model Through The Use of
Community

• 3rd Annual Open Innovation
• Las Vegas, NV
• April 6 - 8, 2009

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Obligatory introductory bit

• Decision Analyst is an international marketing
  consulting and research organization
• Founded in 1978
• Largest independently-owned research firm in the
  U.S.
• Were known for
• Providing custom qualitative and quantitative
  research
• Our panel of over 8 million individuals worldwide
• Established our Insights Innovation business
  unit in 2001
• Marketers and researchers specializing in
  understanding customers/consumers, and new
  product and service innovation

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• In 2001 launched the Imaginators, a proprietary
  innovation community of just over 2000 highly
  creative individuals
• 250,000 individuals tested to date
• Must rank in top 4 to be accepted into the
  Imaginators

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Joel West 2/ 22/08
http//blog.openinnovation.net

• The original goal of Open Innovation
  Researching a New Paradigm was to provide an
  up-to-date and complete orientation to the
  academic study of open innovation we tried to
  come up with a comprehensive framework for open
  innovation research by categorizing what had been
  done and what might be done.
• ...when I went to write my keynote for one of
  the European Academy of Management tracks on
  open innovation, I realized that wed left out
  communities.

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Open Innovation

• Open innovation is the use of purposive inflows
  and outflows of knowledge to accelerate internal
  innovation, and expand the markets for external
  use of innovation, respectively.
• Chesbrough 2006

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Open Innovation

• Open innovation is using the market rather
  internal hierarchies to source and commercialize
  innovations.
• West 2008

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Community

• A group of people who have been brought
  together, or have brought themselves together,
  under a common umbrella and who are having a
  conversation with each other.
• Community 2.0 Conference
• Las Vegas 2007

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Community falls way down on the list

• Firm-to-firm collaboration
• Firm-to-university collaboration
• Hunts and challenges

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Thats not to say no ones using community
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Is community just for high-interest,
high-involvement consumer products?Why isnt
community used as an innovation source by
companies that

• are in categories that arent consumer-centric,
  or that are highly technical?
• are already considered innovative?
• already have a successful innovation process
  in place?

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Assumption Most customers (especially consumers)
cant truly contribute they can offer mundane
or incremental ideas, but not true innovation.

• Forty percent of consumer community members
  offer suggestions that solve urgent problems
• Fifteen percent of those suggestions are
  considered to be a completely new product

How Communities Support Innovative Activities An
Exploration Of Assistance And Sharing Among
End-users Franke Shah 2003
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Assumption Community is like a box of chocolates
you never know what youre going to get.

• The reliability of using communities can be
  greatly enhanced based on what the community is
  willing to invest

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Assumption Research brings the consumer/
customer into the innovation process.

• Research can feed the innovation process, but it
  cant replace it
• Short in duration
• Environment does not elicit innovation
• Evaluative or exploratory process
• Respondents arent necessarily innovative

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Six steps to making community a viable source of
actionable open innovation.

• Start with a clear purpose in mind
• Decide who should comprise the community
• Communicate your end goal clearly and
  appropriately to the community
• Create the right environment
• Motivate them in meaningful ways
• Maintain the quality of the community

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Start with a clear purpose in mind

• Know your goals and make sure the use of the
  community aligns strategically with company
  objectives

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Share
Youve probably taken some great digital pictures
of your friends or family. But how often do
those pictures make it out of your camera and
into an actual frame for others to see and enjoy?
Introducing Share, the innovation from
(wireless brand) that allows you to easily
display your images so they can be enjoyed by
all. The Share is a full-feature cell phone that
also comes with two digital picture frames.
To share images, just Use Share's advanced,
quick-capture digital shutter camera to take your
pictures Connect Share to a picture frame
either wirelessly, via USB, or remotely Select
the images you want to send to that specific
frame Push the Share button and it
immediately sends your picture to the frame
You can even program Share so that it updates
each frame with new images according to a
schedule you set. And frames can be networked
together to show the same images.
Dont let your pictures sit in your camera
collecting digital dust. Bring them out for
everyone to see with (wireless brand)'s Share.
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Decide who should comprise the community.

• All-inclusive is great for vacations, but not
  for innovation
• Learn who can and will contribute
• Dont be afraid to be critical
• There is no magic community member number
• Start with the 100/10/1 rule and go from there
• Qualified members smaller community

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Communicate your end goal clearly and
appropriately to the community.

• Innovation flourishes in a defined environment

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Communicate your end goal clearly and
appropriately to the community.

• 40 Imaginator community members in the EU
• Collaborate on ideas for a new confection
• One group was given free reign
• The other group received clear direction and
  relevant tools
• Effectiveness of each approach evaluated on
• Number of distinct idea categories
• Relevance in addressing the task
• Originality of the ideas

The Case for In-the-Box Innovation, Callahan,
Ishmael Namiranian 2005
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Create the right environment.

• To compete, or not compete?
• If an innovator believes that revealing
  innovation-related information will allow a rival
  to outperform him, the likelihood that the
  innovator will reveal this information will
  decrease unconditionally. (Franke and Shah,
  2003)
• Bound By The Power Of One
• Seek out innovation springboards

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Motivate them in meaningful ways.
Franke Shah 2003
Decision Analyst, Imaginator Study 2009
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Maintain the quality of the community.

• Be sure the members have everything they need to
  be valuable contributors
• Assess members contributions over time
• Dont be afraid to remove members from the
  community
• Keep them busy

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Revolution
Evolution
Turn-key, outsourced innovation communities
Custom innovation communities
Internally developed managed communities
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So if you remember only three things

• Community can be a viable open innovation source
• Six simple steps to making an innovation
  community effective
• How you approach using innovation communities can
  be evolutionary or revolutionary

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Gwen Smith Ishmael, Decision Analyst Insights
Innovation gishmae_at_decisionanalyst.com 604
Avenue H East, Arlington, Texas
76011-3100 817.640.6166 http//www.decisionanalyst
.com http//secondarydata.com Blog
www.ideaflow.com Twitter _at_Gwen_Ishmael