I recently had the pleasure of working with Alan Belniak on a project for our Managing Technology Innovation course in the Babson MBA MTIE track. We collaborated on our final project which developed a business plan for a consulting service that would leverage several platforms to create a solution that helps brands manage innovation by creating a direct link from their technology or product to their user social networks.

The problem we solved was for Brand 1.0 who wanted to transform itself into Brand 2.0. That is, a “traditional” brand that does not see the direct link from technology to user social networks and thereby mismanaging innovation within its organization. Brand 1.0 creates a product and pushes out a message about that product. It assumes that it knows its customers and that its customers will receive the message and the product as Brand 1.0 intended. Brand 1.0’s command-and-control strategy all too often leads its products to failure once they reach the marketplace — or, if the product is a success, Brand 1.0 can’t put its finger on why. ”What just happened?”, Brand 1.0 often asks, “Aren’t we in control of the message about our product? Aren’t we in control of our Brand’s reputation?” Meanwhile, the blogosphere is abuzz with how bad the product is — or, alternatively, the product takes off and is a success, breaking all sales projections. “You’re not in control anymore, Brand 1.0″, the blogosphere, replies. In either case, Brand 1.0 has lost control of its message and its product’s reputation. How can Brand 1.0 get its reputation back? How does Brand 1.0 become Brand 2.0 (a brand that does leverage social networking and social media) and meet its customer where they are?

To read more, visit our project at snproject.pbwiki.com/