Most companies acknowledge that innovation is vital to achieving success, yet more than half of businesses don't have any innovation strategies in place. The reality is that there are some true roadblocks--like resource and budget constraints--which get in the way of focused innovation efforts. However there are other factors, such as strong and visionary leadership, that can foster innovation within a business. 

For hundreds of years of human history, innovation and discovery have occurred simultaneously, by different parties, all over the globe. In fact, it is difficult to find a major technological breakthrough of the last 200 years that didn't have multiple inventors, perhaps working thousands of miles apart, claiming that a particular discovery was theirs. Competition is fundamentally necessary to educate consumers and force companies to be innovative with their product offerings  and business model.

Gamifaction is finding increasing acceptance as a method of problem solving, and is currently being used in a variety of applications to improve user engagement and other important data gathering metrics. An increasing number of businesses are discovering that gamification principles can be applied to help solve their marketing problems as well. Here are just a few examples of specific marketing problems these theories are currently being used to address.

When most people think "guerrilla marketing", they think of startups, which is arguably the industry where the term and tactics are used the most. However, even if you’re running a brick and mortar small business, you can still use guerrilla marketing to your advantage and start getting customers in the door ASAP.

A grand opening for a Springfield business in the South End. Spanning one city block, the new Golden Nozzle Car Wash Plaza is celebrating their opening with half-off prices for any wash package through Saturday.

For Roland Bartels, it’s all about keeping cars clean. After 13 years in the car wash business, he bought out his partner in 2012 and decided to change up his business model so he could maximize his profit and provide better service to his customers.

The Diamond Car Wash & Deli could see a rush of supporters thanks to a small business cash mob organized by ORNL Federal Credit Union. The $1.5 billion credit union in Oak Ridge, Tenn., said it will be giving away $20 gift certificates customers can use at the restaurant and car wash to the first 30 customers.