Twitterville: How Businesses Can Thrive in the New Global Neighborhoods


Shel Israel - 2009
    On Twitter, word can spread faster than wildfire. Companies no longer have the option of ignoring the conversation. Unlike other hot social media spaces, "Twitterville" is dominated by professionals, not students. And despite its size, it still feels like a small town. Twitter allows people to interact much the way they do face-to-face, honestly and authentically. One minute, you re com- plaining about the weather with local friends, the next, you re talking shop with a colleague based halfway across the globe. No matter where you re from or what you do for a living, you will find conversations on Twitter that are valuable. Despite the millions of people joining the site, you ll quickly find the ones who can make a difference to you. Social media writer Shel Israel shares revealing stories of "Twitterville" residents, from CEOs to the student who became the first to report the devastation of the Szechuan earthquake; from visionaries trying to raise money for a cause to citizen journalists who outshine traditional media companies. Israel introduces you to trailblazers such as: . Frank Eliason, who used Twitter to reverse Comcast s blemished customer service reputation . Bill Fergus, who was on the team at Henry Ford Medical Center during the first live tweeted surgery . Scott Monty, social media officer for Ford, who held off a mob of misinformed Ranger fans and averted a PR crisis . Connie Reece, who used Twitter to raise tens of thousands of dollars for cancer patients in need . The Coffee Groundz, a Houston-area coffee shop that uses Twitter to pack the tables (and fight off Starbucks) "Twitterville" features many true stories as dramatic as these. But it also recounts those of ordinary businesspeople who use Twitter to get closer to their customers. And it explains how global neighborhoods will make geography increasingly irrelevant. It even explains why people sometimes really do care what you had for lunch."

Everything I Know about Marketing I Learned from Google


Aaron Goldman - 2010
    Aaron Goldman has written an essential book that goes beyond telling us how Google became so important to explaining why the revolution it's leading will affect everyone in media and marketing." --Brian Morrissey, Digital Editor, Adweek"An insightful tour of the elements that have made Google successful combined with a usable guide on how to apply this learning to your business." --Rishad Tobaccowala, Chief Strategy & Innovation Officer, VivakiAbout the BookYou know you've hit it big when your name becomes a verb--and no one knows that better than Google. In just over 10 years, Google has become the world's most valuable brand, consistently dominating its category and generating $6 billion in revenue per quarter.How does Google do it? In a word: marketing.You may not think Google does much marketing. Indeed, it doesn't do a lot of what has traditionally been viewed as marketing. But in today's digital world, marketing has taken new shape--and Google is at the cutting edge.In Everything I Know about Marketing I Learned from Google, digital marketing expert Aaron Goldman offers 20 powerful lessons straight from Google's playbook. Taking you deep into the inner workings of the Googleplex (which are simpler than you think), Goldman provides the knowledge and tools you need to build and grow your brand (which is also simpler than you think).Along the way, he shows how Google's tactics are being used by a wide range of successful corporations, from Apple to Zappos. Key principles include:Tap into the Wisdom of Crowds: Get the signals you need directly from your customersKeep It Simple, Stupid: Craft messages people can grasp in a nanosecond and pass alongDon't Interrupt: Join the conversation-- but avoid disrupting itAct Like Content: Provide value, not sales pitchesTest Everything: Take no detail of your program for granted; you can always improveShow Off Your Assets: Distribute your brand everywhereThe beauty of it all is that these Googley lessons can be applied to every aspect of marketing, in organizations of any size. Whether you run a PR department in a multinational corporation or serve as the sole marketer in a small business, these tactics work.In its mission to "organize the world's information," Google has rewritten the book on marketing. Use Everything I Know about Marketing I Learned from Google to remake your own organization's marketing--and engage more customers than ever.

Content: Selected Essays on Technology, Creativity, Copyright, and the Future of the Future


Cory Doctorow - 2008
    Content is the first collection of Doctorow’s infamous articles, essays, and polemics.Here’s why Microsoft should stop treating its customers as criminals (through relentless digital-rights management); how America chose copyright and Happy Meal toys over jobs; why Facebook is taking a faceplant; how Wikipedia is a poor cousin of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy; and, of course, why free e-books kick ass.Accessible to geeks and noobs (if you’re not sure what that means, it’s you) alike, Content is a must-have compilation from Cory Doctorow, who will be glad to take you along for the ride as he effortlessly surfs the zeitgeist.

Socialnomics: How Social Media Transforms the Way We Live and Do Business


Erik Qualman - 2009
    You've heard the term, even if you don't use the tools. But just how big has social media become? Social media has officially surpassed pornography as the top activity on the Internet. People would rather give up their e-mail than their social network. It is so powerful that it is causing a macro shift in the way we live and conduct business. Socialnomics charts this shift from the forefront.Brands can now be strengthened or destroyed by the use of social media. Online networking sites are being used as giant, free focus groups. Advertising is less effective at influencing consumers than the opinions of their peers. If you aren't using social media in your business strategy, you are already behind your competition.Explores how the concept of "Socialnomics" is changing the way businesses produce, market, and sell, eliminating inefficient marketing and middlemen, and making products easier and cheaper for consumers to obtain Learn how successful businesses are connecting with consumers like never before via Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and other social media sites A must-read for anyone wanting to learn about, and harness the power of social media, rather than be squashed by it Author Erik Qualman is a former online marketer for several Top 100 brands and the current Global Vice President of Online Marketing for the world's largest private education firm Socialnomics is an essential book for anyone who wants to understand the implications of social media, and how businesses can tap the power of social media to increase their sales, cut their marketing costs, and reach consumers directly.

The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power


Shoshana Zuboff - 2018
    The stakes could not be higher: a global architecture of behavior modification threatens human nature in the twenty-first century just as industrial capitalism disfigured the natural world in the twentieth.Zuboff vividly brings to life the consequences as surveillance capitalism advances from Silicon Valley into every economic sector. Vast wealth and power are accumulated in ominous new "behavioral futures markets," where predictions about our behavior are bought and sold, and the production of goods and services is subordinated to a new "means of behavioral modification."The threat has shifted from a totalitarian Big Brother state to a ubiquitous digital architecture: a "Big Other" operating in the interests of surveillance capital. Here is the crucible of an unprecedented form of power marked by extreme concentrations of knowledge and free from democratic oversight. Zuboff's comprehensive and moving analysis lays bare the threats to twenty-first century society: a controlled "hive" of total connection that seduces with promises of total certainty for maximum profit--at the expense of democracy, freedom, and our human future.With little resistance from law or society, surveillance capitalism is on the verge of dominating the social order and shaping the digital future--if we let it.Table of contentsINTRODUCTION1. Home or exile in the digital futureI. THE FOUNDATIONS OF SURVEILLANCE CAPITALISM2. August 9, 2011: Setting the stage for Surveillance Capitalism3. The discovery of behavioral surplus4. The moat around the castle5. The elaboration of Surveillance Capitalism: Kidnap, corner, compete6. Hijacked: The division of learning in societyII. THE ADVANCE OF SURVEILLANCE CAPITALISM7. The reality business8. Rendition: From experience to data9. Rendition from the depths10. Make them dance11. The right to the future tenseIII. INSTRUMENTARIAN POWER FOR A THIRD MODERNITY12. Two species of power13. Big Other and the rise of instrumentarian power14. A utopia of certainty15, The instrumentarian collective16. Of life in the hive17. The right to sanctuaryCONCLUSION18. A coup from aboveAcknowledgementsAbout the authorDetailed table of contentsNotesIndex

How My Blog Got 1 Million Visits In 7 Months: A practical and straightforward guide to increasing traffic to your blog in your spare time - and without having to pay for advertising


Patric Morgan - 2015
    For some, blogging is a pastime, a hobby, something to fulfil a creative need. But some take blogging one step further. Many individuals, with no special training, are using their blog/s as a part-time or even a full-time job. You may already have a blog that could do with a few more visitors. Or maybe you’re thinking of setting up a blog but are not sure where to start. The question most people ask me is ‘How do I get visitors to my blog?’ It’s like setting up a shop on the High Street and facing the challenge of getting people in the door. The good news is – I have answers that will see your visitor count lift substantially. All you need is a computer, an internet connection and a brain (your own preferably). Here’s what you don’t need: money. This book answers your blogging questions in a practical and straightforward way. How My Blog Got 1 Million Visits In 7 Months has been designed to show you how to drive people to your blog – and how to keep them coming back, time after time. It’s designed for bloggers and for those who have websites that could do with more traffic. I’m a multi-award winning blogger and publisher and have been for over eight years. When I first started blogging, I got very excited to see that one person kept visiting my site. That was until I realised that the analytics was, in fact, counting me as a visitor. I’ve learned a lot since. My latest blog broke through the 1,000,000 visit mark after just 7 months. As a result, my blog is now a profitable business. I haven’t spent a penny on advertising and I spend about 30 minutes a day blogging at most. I’ve picked up a large-scale book deal as a direct result of my blog. In this book, I’ll show you the basics of setting up your blog; how to write content that people will just want to click on and share with their friends; how to create viral posts that will see your visitor statistics balloon; how to write content for your website that will sell your services or products; how to optimise your posts for search engines and how to make money from your blog. My promise to you is this - if you use the tips and tricks that I am about to show you, your site will get more traffic and you can start making money from it. These are proven techniques that you can start implementing on your blog straight away. Run the kind of blog that other bloggers envy. Be the kind of blogger that people marvel at. It’ll make you feel pretty good, I guarantee it. Find out how right now. *** “Patric Morgan's How My Blog Got 1 Million Visitors in 7 Months makes me sick! I've got 15,000+ people on my combined social media and I've never gotten even close to a million visits on my site. Screw you, Patric! However – I have read through his book and have found some cool tricks to steal and apply. Shh...don't tell him.” Vicki Abelson, Author of ‘Don't Jump’, published October '15 from Carl Reiner's Random Content. “What an absolutely incredible 'How to Guide'. This book will give you the tools you need to increase your web traffic and create a viral sensation from your blog or website. Follow the common sense approach within these pages and maybe you'll be writing your own success story very soon. A must read for any avid blogger trying to step up into the big leagues. Buy it now!” Nigel Shinner, Author of the critically acclaimed novel ‘From Within’ “It’s good to read something that actually delivers on the title of the book.

The Social Media Marketing Book


Dan Zarrella - 2009
    With an objective approach and clear, straightforward language, Dan Zarrella, aka "The Social Media & Marketing Scientist," shows you how to plan and implement campaigns intelligently, and then measure results and track return on investment. Whether you're a seasoned pro or new to the social web, this book will take you beyond the jargon to social media marketing mastery.Make sense of this complicated environment with the help of screenshots, graphs, and visual explanationsUnderstand the history and culture of each social media type, including features, functionality, and protocolsGet clear-cut explanations of the methods you need to trigger viral marketing successesChoose the technologies and marketing tactics most relevant to your campaign goalsLearn how to set specific goals for your campaigns and evaluate them according to key performance indicators Praise for The Social Media Marketing Book: "Let Zarrella take you to social-media marketing school. You'll learn more from reading this book than a month of research on the Internet." --Guy Kawasaki, co-founder of Alltop.com "If I could be any other person for a day, it would be Dan Zarella. Either him or Brad Pitt. But Dan's smarter. This book is why I say that." --Chris Brogan, President of New Marketing Labs "This book demonstrates a beginning to the endless possibilities of the Social Web." -- Brian Solis, publisher of leading marketing blog PR 2.0

Public Parts: How Sharing in the Digital Age is Revolutionizing Life, Business, and Society


Jeff Jarvis - 2011
    More than 750 million people (and half of all Americans) use Facebook, where we share a billion times a day. The collective voice of Twitter echoes instantly 100 million times daily, from Tahrir Square to the Mall of America, on subjects that range from democratic reform to unfolding natural disasters to celebrity gossip. New tools let us share our photos, videos, purchases, knowledge, friendships, locations, and lives.Yet change brings fear, and many people--nostalgic for a more homogeneous mass culture and provoked by well-meaning advocates for privacy--despair that the internet and how we share there is making us dumber, crasser, distracted, and vulnerable to threats of all kinds. But not Jeff Jarvis.In this shibboleth-destroying book, "Public Parts "argues persuasively and personally that the internet and our new sense of publicness are, in fact, doing the opposite. Jarvis travels back in time to show the amazing parallels of fear and resistance that met the advent of other innovations such as the camera and the printing press. The internet, he argues, will change business, society, and life as profoundly as Gutenberg's invention, shifting power from old institutions to us all.Based on extensive interviews, "Public Parts "introduces us to the men and women building a new industry based on sharing. Some of them have become household names--Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg, Google's Eric Schmidt, and Twitter's Evan Williams. Others may soon be recognized as the industrialists, philosophers, and designers of our future. Jarvis explores the promising ways in which the internet and publicness allow us to collaborate, think, ways--how we manufacture and market, buy and sell, organize and govern, teach and learn. He also examines the necessity as well as the limits of privacy in an effort to understand and thus protect it. This new and open era has already profoundly disrupted economies, industries, laws, ethics, childhood, and many other facets of our daily lives. But the change has just begun. The shape of the future is not assured. The amazing new tools of publicness can be used to good ends and bad. The choices--and the responsibilities--lie with us. Jarvis makes an urgent case that the future of the internet--what one technologist calls "the eighth continent"--requires as much protection as the physical space we share, the air we breathe, and the rights we afford one another. It is a space of the public, for the public, and by the public. It needs protection and respect from all of us. As Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in the wake of the uprisings in the Middle East, "If people around the world are going to come together every day online and have a safe and productive experience, we need a shared vision to guide us." Jeff Jarvis has that vision and will be that guide.

The Information Diet: A Case for Conscious Consumption


Clay A. Johnson - 2011
    Not eating, but gorging on information ceaselessly spewed from the screens and speakers we hold dear. Just as we have grown morbidly obese on sugar, fat, and flour—so, too, have we become gluttons for texts, instant messages, emails, RSS feeds, downloads, videos, status updates, and tweets.We're all battling a storm of distractions, buffeted with notifications and tempted by tasty tidbits of information. And just as too much junk food can lead to obesity, too much junk information can lead to cluelessness. The Information Diet shows you how to thrive in this information glut—what to look for, what to avoid, and how to be selective. In the process, author Clay Johnson explains the role information has played throughout history, and why following his prescribed diet is essential for everyone who strives to be smart, productive, and sane.In The Information Diet, you will:Discover why eminent scholars are worried about our state of attention and general intelligenceExamine how today’s media—Big Info—give us exactly what we want: content that confirms our beliefsLearn to take steps to develop data literacy, attention fitness, and a healthy sense of humorBecome engaged in the economics of information by learning how to reward good information providersJust like a normal, healthy food diet, The Information Diet is not about consuming less—it’s about finding a healthy balance that works for you

Disrupting Digital Business: Create an Authentic Experience in the Peer-to-Peer Economy


R "Ray" Wang - 2015
    The digital transformation demands that we focus our attention on experiences and outcomes. Business leaders and their organizations must shift to keeping promises—no matter how their customers interact with them.But organizations no longer control the conversation. In this era of social and mobile technology, customers, employees, suppliers, and partners are in direct communication with one another. Those personal networks and the brands they’re passionate about influence their decision making and their spending.The workforce has changed too. Employees expect to be able to determine when and how they will work, the technology they’ll use, and the values their company will espouse.Organizations can take part in this conversation only if they recognize how and where it’s happening. Resisting these changes will leave executives, managers, and their companies powerless. Organizations must pivot with and ahead of these social, organizational, and technological shifts or risk being left behind.Technology guru Ray Wang shows how organizations can surf the waves of change—how they can keep their promises. Current trends, when taken seriously, require a new way of thinking about business that includes five key areas:1. Consumerization of technology and the new C-suite2. Data’s influence in driving decisions3. Digital marketing transformation4. The future of work5. Matrix commerceDigital disruption has changed how we do our work. But by mastering these trends you’ll delight your customers with every interaction.

Leadership: Tidbits and Treasures


Chris Brady - 2008
    Here is a book that will stimulate your thinking and help you to be successful in your work, your study, and in your every day living. Our prayer is that it will also educated the reader in the areas of history, politics, economics and the culture war that is currently upon us. the articles and illustrtions from great thinkers and doers throughout history outlined on these pages, will, if studied and applied to your life, help develop your inner qualities, and that is where your real wealth is.

Spam Kings: The Real Story behind the High-Rolling Hucksters Pushing Porn, Pills, and %*@)# Enlargements


Brian S. McWilliams - 2004
    This year alone, five trillion spam messages will clog Internet users in-boxes, costing society an estimated $10-billion in lost productivity, filtering software, and other expenses.Spam Kings: The Real Story behind the High-Rolling Hucksters Pushing Porn, Pills, and %*@)# Enlargements is the first book to expose the shadowy world of the people responsible for the junk email problem. Author and veteran investigative journalist Brian S. McWilliams delivers a compelling account of the cat-and-mouse game played by spam entrepreneurs in search of easy fortunes and those who are trying to stop them.Spam Kings chronicles the evolution of Davis Wolfgang Hawke, a notorious neo-Nazi leader (Jewish-born) who got into junk email in 1999. Using Hawke as a case study, Spam Kings traces the twenty-year-old neophyte's rise in the spam trade to his emergence as a major player in the lucrative penis pill market--a business that would eventually make him a millionaire and the target of lawsuits from AOL and others.Spam Kings also tells the parallel story of Susan Gunn, a computer novice in California who is reluctantly drawn into the spam wars and eventually joins a group of anti-spam activists. Her volunteer sleuth work puts her on a collision course with Hawke and other spammers, who try to wreak revenge on the antis. You'll also meet other cyber-vigilantes who have taken up the fight against spammers as well as the cast of quirky characters who comprise Hawke's business associates.The book sheds light on the technical sleight-of-hand--forged headers, open relays, harvesting tools, and bulletproof hosting--and other sleazy business practices that spammers use; the work of top anti-spam attorneys; the surprising new partnership developing between spammers and computer hackers; and the rise of a new breed of computer viruses designed to turn the PCs of innocent bystanders into secret spam factories.

Irresistible: The Rise of Addictive Technology and the Business of Keeping Us Hooked


Adam Alter - 2017
    We obsess over our emails, Instagram likes, and Facebook feeds; we binge on TV episodes and YouTube videos; we work longer hours each year; and we spend an average of three hours each day using our smartphones. Half of us would rather suffer a broken bone than a broken phone, and Millennial kids spend so much time in front of screens that they struggle to interact with real, live humans. In this revolutionary book, Adam Alter, a professor of psychology and marketing at NYU, tracks the rise of behavioral addiction, and explains why so many of today's products are irresistible. Though these miraculous products melt the miles that separate people across the globe, their extraordinary and sometimes damaging magnetism is no accident. The companies that design these products tweak them over time until they become almost impossible to resist. By reverse engineering behavioral addiction, Alter explains how we can harness addictive products for the good—to improve how we communicate with each other, spend and save our money, and set boundaries between work and play—and how we can mitigate their most damaging effects on our well-being, and the health and happiness of our children.

Why You Need to Start Network Marketing: How to Remove Risk and Have a Better Life


Keith Schreiter - 2016
    Discover the real reason why people around the world are adding network marketing to their lives. In this book you will learn: * Why network marketing is a natural thing for us to do. * How to present network marketing so that prospects "get it." * The real power behind our business. * Why jobs are nice, but risky ... and what we can do about it. * How to take a different view of the big picture. * Chances of failure and the absence of guarantees. * Understanding wealth ... and being broke. * The easiest way to spread your message. Short, compact, and to the point. A fast read, and a faster life-changer. Here is your chance to see what others see. Scroll up and get your copy now!

Cognitive Surplus: Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age


Clay Shirky - 2010
     For decades, technology encouraged people to squander their time and intellect as passive consumers. Today, tech has finally caught up with human potential. In Cognitive Surplus, Internet guru Clay Shirky forecasts the thrilling changes we will all enjoy as new digital technology puts our untapped resources of talent and goodwill to use at last. Since we Americans were suburbanized and educated by the postwar boom, we've had a surfeit of intellect, energy, and time-what Shirky calls a cognitive surplus. But this abundance had little impact on the common good because television consumed the lion's share of it-and we consume TV passively, in isolation from one another. Now, for the first time, people are embracing new media that allow us to pool our efforts at vanishingly low cost. The results of this aggregated effort range from mind expanding-reference tools like Wikipedia-to lifesaving-such as Ushahidi.com, which has allowed Kenyans to sidestep government censorship and report on acts of violence in real time. Shirky argues persuasively that this cognitive surplus-rather than being some strange new departure from normal behavior-actually returns our society to forms of collaboration that were natural to us up through the early twentieth century. He also charts the vast effects that our cognitive surplus- aided by new technologies-will have on twenty-first-century society, and how we can best exploit those effects. Shirky envisions an era of lower creative quality on average but greater innovation, an increase in transparency in all areas of society, and a dramatic rise in productivity that will transform our civilization. The potential impact of cognitive surplus is enormous. As Shirky points out, Wikipedia was built out of roughly 1 percent of the man-hours that Americans spend watching TV every year. Wikipedia and other current products of cognitive surplus are only the iceberg's tip. Shirky shows how society and our daily lives will be improved dramatically as we learn to exploit our goodwill and free time like never before.