Innovation is certainly a buzzword in the PR industry. It's the subject of conferences and internal meetings, it's a quality that can set an agency apart in new-business pitches, and, perhaps most important, it's something that is essential to the industry's future.

This is especially true in a time where PR practitioners face challenges related to a constantly changing media climate, a harder-to-reach consumer, and other marketing disciplines encroaching on their turf.

The past several years have certainly seen an explosion ...