Synopses & Reviews
The book that sparked a marketing revolution."This is a subversive book. It says that the marketer is not--and ought not to be--at the center of successful marketing. The customer should be. Are you ready for that?" --From the Foreword by Malcolm Gladwell, author of The Tipping Point.
Counter to traditional marketing wisdom, which tries to count, measure, and manipulate the spread of information, Seth Godin argues that the information can spread most effectively from customer to customer, rather than from business to customer. Godin calls this powerful customer-to- customer dialogue the ideavirus, and cheerfully eggs marketers on to create an environment where their ideas can replicate and spread.
In lively detail, Godin looks at the ways companies such as PayPal, Hotmail, GeoCities, even Volkswagen have successfully launched ideaviruses. He offers a "recipe" for creating your own ideavirus, identifies the key factors in the successful spread of an ideavirus (powerful sneezers, hives, a clear vector, a smooth, friction-free transmission), and shows how any business, large or small, can use ideavirus marketing to succeed in a world that just doesn't want to hear it anymore from the traditional marketers.
Review
"This is the only (idea) virus that will save you time and make you money." (Guy Kawasaki, CEO, garage.com, and author of Rules for Revolutionaries)
Review
". . . Unleashing the IdeaVirus informs, instructs, and entertains, offering the reader both roadmap and owner's manual for the car." (Chris Meyer, director, Ernst & Young Center for Business Innovation, and co-author of Blur)
Review
". . . whatever Seth is selling is catching -- and if you spend time with him, you'll come down with it." (Alan M. Webber, founding editor, Fast Company)
Synopsis
Seth Godin's bold and provocative manifesto for marketing in the 21st century is now available in paperback -- with a new afterword. Turn your ideas into epidemics by helping your customers do the marketing for you. Seth Godin is an adman's worst nightmare. He has made a career of exposing the limitations of traditional marketing methods while offering his own visionary solutions. He has also demonstrated the principles of the IdeaVirus firsthand: More than 250,000 copies of his e-book, Unleashing the IdeaVirus, have spread throughout the Web for free. Napster, Hotmail, GeoCities, and Volkswagen are just a few of the businesses that have successfully launched their products with an IdeaVirus by letting customers get to know and communicate with each other. This customer-to-customer dialogue spreads like a virus, costs companies next to nothing, and could signal the end to marketing as we know it. Now Godin shows how any business can unleash an IdeaVirus and profit from it. "This is a subversive book. It says that the marketer is not -- and ought not to be -- at the center of successful marketing. The customer should be. Are you ready for that?" --from the foreword by Malcolm Gladwell, author of The Tipping Point
About the Author
Seth Godin is the author of numerous books, including the national bestseller Permission Marketing. He was the founder of Yoyodyne, the first direct marketer on the Internet, which was acquired by Yahoo! in 1998. Godin served as Vice President of Direct Marketing for Yahoo! until early 2000, when he left to devote time to writing and speaking.