Product Description

""A solid... insightful explanation of how the Internet has armed the consumer—which is to say, everyone—against the mindless blather of corporate messaging attempts. Drop everything and read this book.""—The Wall Street Journal

The woman next to you in the coffee shop, typing madly on her laptop, just might be determining the ending to next year's block-buster film or how quickly the hottest new PDAT hits store shelves. In homes, dorm rooms, waiting rooms, planes and trains around the world, millions of people are exercising enormous influence on what we buy, even though they have no official connection to those products and services.

Who are they? What motivates them? Marketing experts Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba explore the ramifications of social media in Citizen Marketers. As everyday people increasingly create content on behalf of companies, brands or products, they are collaborating with others just like themselves and forming ever-growing communities of enhusiasts and evangelists. From the rough to the sophisticated, the ""user-generated media"" of blogs, online bulletin boards, podcasts, photos, songs, and animations are influencing companies' customer relationships, product design, and marketing campaigns, whether they participate willingly or not.

Citizen Marketers is the first book to document this phenomenon, examining some of the early winners and losers in this new genre, as well as some of its most noted constituents. With their exceptional knowledge of brands, products, companies and industries, the citizen marketers are democratizing traditional notions of communication and marketing, even entire business models.

Features:

• Research on social media
• Case studies of people and organizations fueling the growth of citizen marketing
• Clarifies the context and importance of technological and societal shifts that are changing the nature of customer expectations and relationships

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #35300 in Books
• Published on: 2006-12-01
• Released on: 2006-12-01
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 224 pages

Review
""A solid... insightful explanation of how the Internet has armed the consumer—which is to say, everyone—against the mindless blather of corporate messaging attempts. Drop everything and read this book.""—The Wall Street Journal

From the Inside Flap
The woman sitting next to you at Starbucks focused intently on her laptop may just be determining the next big thing. In coffee houses, offices, homes, dorm rooms, and airport lounges around the world, millions of people use laptops and cell phones to become today's new publishers and broadcasters. Armed with only a broadband connection, these regular citizens are exercising enormous influence on culture and what we buy. Who are they? What motivates them? In their provocative new book, Citizen Marketers, Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba explore the ramifications of today's burgeoning social media. As everyday people increasingly create content on behalf of companies, brands, or products—to which they have no official connection—they are turning traditional notions of media upside down. Collaborating with others just like themselves, they are forming ever-growing communities of enthusiasts and evangelists using videos, photos, songs, and animations, as well as the "user-generated media" of blogs, online bulletin boards, and podcasts. From the rough to the sophisticated, their creations are influencing companies' customer relationships, product design, and marketing campaigns—whether the companies participate willingly or not. Whether freeing Fiona Apple, building buzz for Snakes on a Plane, or denouncing Dell Hell, citizen marketers are democratizing traditional notions of communication and marketing, even entire business models. Citizen Marketers examines some of the early winners and losers in this new culture of business, as well as some of its most noted constituents.

From the Back Cover
Advance Praise for Citizen Marketers: "In the Internet age, the medium is no longer the message. As Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba show in this extraordinary book, people are now the message. Tens of millions of intrinsically motivated, self-expressive amateur content creators are overturning the old marketing orthodoxies. Citizen Marketers is a brilliant guide to this new landscape. It bursts with so many fresh insights and so much smart advice, you'll need a second highlighter."
—Daniel H. Pink, author of A Whole New Mind and Free Agent Nation "Citizen Marketers has really inspired my thinking and the direction I am taking with my marketing team. Jackie Huba and Ben McConnell have convinced me of the way to engage today's consumer and provide a roadmap for how to do it."
—Cammie Dunaway, Chief Marketing Officer, Yahoo! Praise for Creating Customer Evangelists:
"[Creating Customer Evangelists] is the new mantra for entrepreneurial success."--The New York Times "An inspiring and thorough book packed with real-life examples, action items, and insights."--Emanuel Rosen, author of The Anatomy of Buzz

Customer Reviews

Stories without insights
Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba have cobbled together a collection of stories showing how bloggers, social networkers, and other online denizens have a platform to spread criticim - and commendations - widely over the internet via blogs and videos. Examples include bloggers who are shedding critical light on Dell, Apple's iPod, McDonald's, NetFlix, Comcast, and others.

But so what? Is there a marketer left on the planet who doesn't know that customers have this power? This, alone, is not enough content for a book. At best, this might make a two-page article in "Duh!" magazine.

There are no insights. It doesn't explore important implications for marketers, like the best way to respond to online criticism, how to fire up customer evangelists, how to engage with the blogger community, how to measure the effectiveness of a company-sponsored online community, or any other practical advice other than "the world has changed, you need to change with it." Even their thin attempts at insights - categorizing citizen marketers into four categories - is just left dangling, with no follow through on how to use these categories to inform your marketing strategy.

This book copies the format of another marketing fake - Seth Godin - by delivering a series of stories but failing to boil out the insights. We need FEWER of these self-indulgent, lazy and intellectually flabby books.

Good lessons for Old School Marketers, and New School Marketers, of course.
I'm a fan of these guys [Jackie Huba & Ben McConnel]. As most of you, I also met them with Creating Customer Evangelists: How Loyal Customers Become a Volunteer Sales Force, I even bought the Discussion Guide and follow their Blog everyday.
The fact is that this book covers really great experiences of lots of industries. One of my favorites is placed in the Record Industry, I thinkg that if they'd wrote the book these days, RadioHead would be a great case for the book.
More interesting lessons come every chapter, and more than a "Handbook", it's a Review one. And it will definetly be a classic record of our new marketing era.
So... Old School Marketing guys... this could be a book that shows you that Marketing is not the same, since several years ago.

The Authority on New Marketing and Social Media
I can't believe this book came out at the end of 2006. I just read a brand new book on a similar subject which referenced a lot of the same examples. No wonder Ben and Jackie have quickly become the authority on social media and new marketing.