Social Innovation in Creative Companies: An exploratory study of how companies in the Danish creative industries utilize social platforms for open innovation

Abstract

This thesis is positioned in the intersecting field of social media, open innovation and creative industries – a field interesting to address due to industry relevance and identified gaps in previous literature. Through a descriptive and exploratory research, the facilitating processes for utilizing social media for open innovation are conceptualized. The literature review and theoretical framework lay the foundation for the qualitative research of a multiple-case study. As our area of interest is in the intersection of more academic fields, the theoretical framework consists of current theories within each field; Social Media Honeycomb, Toolkits for Innovation and Bounded Creativity. The methodological framework for qualitative data collection, with interview as the main collection method, serves as a way to research the context of social innovation projects. To address our aim of research, the multiple-case study on projects at Statens Museum for Kunst, Bianco, Fritz Hansen, Nordisk Film Interactive and Zara is conducted. In the descriptive and exploratory analyses, it is presented how these companies facilitate innovation by going beyond the notion of social platforms as a media only for communication. The intersecting field fosters a variety of purposes and strategies to exploit social media for innovation. Through the research it has been found that the use of social media building blocks depends on the extent of interaction, and if the companies extract value from the individual submissions or from the interplay among community members. Further, innovation toolkits are utilized to set boundaries for creative contributions. Finally, to engage users, extrinsic and intrinsic motivational factors should be balanced with the purpose of the projects and the expected commitment. The above-mentioned findings conceptualize the intersection of how creative companies use social media for open innovation.