How to create Fourth of July fireworks in the office with the help of Google’s newly launched Prizes.org

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If you’ve heard of 99Designs then Google’s latest venture, Prizes.org, which has just been launched on the quiet yesterday will feel familiar.

In essence, Prizes.org allows you to create a contest for tasks on nearly any topic you choose – not just graphic design jobs but anything from tips for hassle-free plane journeys with kids, help naming a company, new running route suggestions and so on.

Google Prizes.org homepage screenshot

The team responsible for the creation of this crowd sourcing site is a largely autonomous team that Google acquired last year called Slide. Before you create a contest you must purchase credits (1 credit costs $1 USD). At the moment the platform is in Beta and is only open to contest creators that have a “credit history” meaning they have to have participated in or created contests in the past, but this restriction will likely be lifted eventually.

The great social element of the site comes through the fact that competition entrants can receive votes from other users to aid contest creators when they come to select a winner. Social networks are likely to play a big part in encouraging others to participate and spread the news about the platform itself due to the fact you must sign up to the site using Facebook Connect or your Twitter account (strangely, no Google+ integration as yet).

Google Prizes.org activities screenshot

So how can YOU use social crowd sourcing for your business?

At the time of writing, the contest for helping to name a screen printing company in Cleveland has received 131 entries and 73 votes. Good going for day 1 of the site going live.

Google Prizes contest status

[If you're feeling generous, you can vote for my entry in the competition here: http://prizes.org/p/qBBMXit2DOhl ]

Granted, many of these people will be testing the platform and wanting to take part in a bid to gain an early invite to become a contest creator. But this also goes to show just how small the barrier to entry is for people to sign up and contribute to business ideas.

Imagine this:

• What if your company had a repository for innovative ideas or a solutions pool for suggested problems to solve?
• What if you incentivised contributions to this in a similar way and got everyone involved with voting?

Incentives needn’t be monetary, you could have another fun prize such as vouchers, free coffee from a local cafe for a week, or even team incentives in the form of a cupcake delivery to the winning team in the office! Who doesn’t like cupcakes?

Happy Fourth of July!

Have you used social networks or crowd sourcing to help encourage innovation or solve tasks within your company? Which schemes would you consider and which ones would you trash?