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Happywork Reviews, Happywork Podcasts, Happywork Tweets, Happywork Everything!

This blog post serves several purposes:

1. It’s a compendium of reviews for my book Happywork. (mostly happy reviews, no doubt!)
2. It’s a compendium of podcasts, interviews, and recorded speaking engagements supporting the book.
3. It’s a repository for all the fun tweets flying around about the book.

Here we go!

REVIEWS

Happywork on Goodreads
Amazon reviews of Happywork
8 Ways To Ruin Your Office Culture by Dave Kerpen (huge HUGE comments section here)
Travis Sheridan’s review
Adam Purcell’s review
Mike Stenger’s review
Joi Sigers’ review on SelfHelpDaily.com
St Louis Staffing mentioned Happywork in a blog post – thank you Susan Martin!
Jeremy Nulik’s review on the KolbeCo blog – detailed and awesome

PODCASTS

My appearance on the Mark Reardon Show on KMOX Radio
Marketing Profs with Kerry O’Shea Gorgone – Kerry, you’re the best!
Jeffrey Shaw’s Creative Warriors podcast – excellent questions here!
2 Regular Guys podcast – talking t-shirts, just like the old days.
Bud Hennekes’ A Boundless World podcast
Vernon Ross’ Social Strategy podcast – We went for 90 minutes!
Likeable Radio with Dave Kerpen – download episode 59!
Will Hanke’s “Online Marketing: Navigating the Rapids” podcast
Culture Radio with John Gardner
The Entrepreneur’s Library with Wade Danielson – a fun chance to talk about the book for 15 minutes straight!
Deb Krier on Mile Hi Radio – take a listen, I think she only asked a few questions. We just talked!
Mitch Matthews’ Dream, Think, Do podcast – coming soon

 
MEDIA


LINK to video, in case the above player doesn’t work

 
TWEETS

Dream tweet:

[Read more…]

Book Review: Zombie Loyalists by Peter Shankman

Zombies1
Companies often churn through customers. Terrible and scary, but true.

Through bad customer service (along with lousy product, weak branding, and a host of other challenges), the good customers leave, and new ones have to be harvested. In fact, one of the most important metrics you’ll often hear a publicly traded company cite is their customer acquisition rate, and I suppose that’s because customer acquisition equals growth. However, where’s the “Customers hightailing it out of there” metric? Shouldn’t we pay some attention to that?

Upon reading Peter Shankman‘s latest book, “Zombie Loyalists,” I came to the following forehead-smacking, “DUHHH!” conclusion: Why not just hold on to your good customers, and turn them into your unholy marketing army of the night?

OK, that last part was all Peter. Truthfully, I don’t like zombies movies at all, nor the idea of zombies. But they are a fitting allegory of what Peter would like to see companies embrace: their best customers!

Peter introduces two stats that lay it out perfectly: 80% of companies think they provide superior customer service, and 8% of customers agree. WHAAAAAAA? That is abjectly horrible. To cop some corporate jargon, we’re nowhere close to being in “alignment” here! (note: if you’re reading his book and saying to yourself, “This is just common sense; Peter is telling me nothing new, so it’s 1-star review time …” I say bollocks. Look at the above stat. Even if you think you know this stuff, you’re not doing it. So you need to hear it again.)

Why have we forgotten that positive word of mouth rules? Over the past 5-7 years, the gullible have been swayed by the supposedly unlimited power of social media, as if those who wield it are sorcerers. Meanwhile, real human workers are treating real human customers like crap. Peter introduces many examples of this, which helps the message steep a bit for the reader.

Peter correctly points out that most customer service sucks, which means you don’t even have to try that hard to provide some simple delight to your fans. It’s a sad state of affairs when we say, “This works so great because of how bad things have gotten.” Not a knock on Peter, at all. It’s a knock on the current state of human customer service, most of which really does suck. To wit, have a heartbeat and a smile and you’re like in the top 10 percentile of customer service. You can lament this, or just take advantage of it.

Peter’s idea is to “infect” your customers by “biting” them with great customer service, which includes taking great care of them and providing them with unexpected delight. Peter again provides wonderful real-world examples, and implores the reader to work hard at this. The goal is to empower those zombies so that they can infect others.

A quick aside: No, these methods don’t always work. You’ll work hard to delight customers, and some will still write nasty things about you online, or worse, never patronize your business again. Look, if you have a decision maker citing this fact as the reason for not conducting your affairs in this way, that person is a shortsighted moron. I have noticed the art of unfair arguing usually involves lobbing such worthless invective – pointing out the examples where it didn’t work. Like, after a terrible school shooting, they’ll poll the community while emotions are running high, and 7% of people will still want free guns handed out with drivers licenses. Or those old toothpaste ads – 4 out of 5 dentists prefer Crest – who was that silly 5th dentist!? You get the idea. You can’t please everyone! But, if you can create an army of rabid fans, you’re going to be pleasing a whole bunch of people! That’s what you want to make happen.

Peter did it to me. He infected me. He was the first – THE FIRST – person to endorse my book, and he did so enthusiastically. I was so excited! Now, I don’t care if the Dalai Lama endorses my book – Peter’s name is not coming off the top of my book. Oh, what was that Peter? You want me to run through a brick wall for you? No problem. ON IT!

GREATEST TAKEAWAY – most customer service is bad. Your threshold for success isn’t that high! Try! (and I will tack on the fact that these are human beings we’re dealing with here. Reason enough to try! Please!)

In my opinion, Zombie Loyalists is better than Nice Companies Finish First (which happened to be an inspiration to me as I was writing my own book). With Zombie Loyalists, Peter does two things well: 1. He gets you in the right mindset to start building your loyal zombie army of followers (mindset is so critical, and too often overlooked), and 2. He give you many examples of how to do it. So the book is both inspirational and tactical. And Peter’s personality comes through, which keeps it very readable.

Thank you, Peter, for writing this. Two undead thumbs up!

Order Zombie Loyalists here! (not an affiliate link. Just order the book ’cause it’s awesome)

Brand Against The Machine – John Morgan’s New Book Redefines Branding

I had the great pleasure of interviewing John Morgan, author of the new book Brand Against the Machine: How to Build Your Brand, Cut Through the Marketing Noise, and Stand Out from the Competition (Amazon affiliate link). I got to know John through Twitter, and he was gracious enough to send me a pre-release copy of the book.

As I admit in the video, I am only about halfway through the book (I suck at finding time to read). However, just like Rework (affiliate link again), you can pick this book up and grab awesome nuggets of information without having to wade through 20-page chapters. It’s written in my kind of style: short to-the-point chapters that don’t ramble on.

In this interview, John reveals the road traveled from teenager with confidence issues to author and public speaker, what it took to get a book deal, and why companies need to think of branding in a much different way.

Thank you John for giving me an hour of your Sunday, and for being so open and honest during this interview. I hope this book goes huge for you. Finally, thank you for the advice you gave me. I hope to repeat your great success.

Below is an affiliate link:

Smarter, Faster, Cheaper By David Siteman Garland – Book Review

We are living through the democratization of entrepreneurship. With free-to-inexpensive tools like Flip Cams, Viddler, YouTube, WordPress, Tumblr, Posterous, Foursquare, Twitter, and Facebook (whew!), both existing and budding entrepreneurs have an unprecedented opportunity to make a name for themselves, get attention for their company, and ultimately sell more stuff. But note this: the steps to take that will get you from relative unknown to seller of lots of stuff are many.

You cannot simply shout about your product from your marketing bullhorn. Your goal should be to let people get to know you, and the way to do that is to become a trusted resource. Who do people turn to when they want to know about [insert name of what you sell]?  If they turn to you for such help, they are way more likely to turn to you when it’s time to buy.

I’ve been friends with David Siteman Garland for a bit over a year now – light years in terms of social media! I’ve been attending his RISE lunches here in St. Louis for almost that long, and I’ve been a presenter at two of them. I’ve learned so much from his blog/TV show The Rise To The Top, including how to become a trusted resource. Honestly, this blog and my willingness to do speaking engagements were borne of advice David gave me. Most importantly, I’ve been inspired by him to break out of my comfort zone and try things (like video).

So it was with great pleasure that I received a very special package in the mail last week – David’s first book Smarter, Faster, Cheaper – Non-Boring Fluff Free Strategies For Marketing And Promoting Your Business (Amazon affiliate link). I was actually proud of David when I first ripped open the envelope – what a great feeling to beholding the debut book of a good friend. As I state in the video, David is probably the most famous person that I actually know, and selfishly, that’s pretty cool. I fully expect David to go Hollywood after this book blows up. But, until he starts driving Bentleys around and acting weird (his quote, not mine!), I’ll continue to consider him a friend. 🙂

At 230 pages, the book is no lightweight. It contains 16 chapters of very compelling content. David uses real-life examples throughout the book to make the case that online content will generate the inbound leads your company needs to bring in new business (as opposed to cold-calling). He pulls examples from first-hand experience, as he’s interviewed hundreds of the brightest entrepreneurs and thought leaders in the world.

With a tinge of bias but a ton of truth, I can highly recommend this book. Real life examples, behind-the-scenes info on how David does what he does (he’s not secretive about what camera he uses, how he hosts video, etc), and a personal writing style that engages you make this a fantastic must-read. David, thank you for getting me an advance copy of Smarter, Faster, Cheaper. You have a great deal to be proud of, as this book is quite an accomplishment. I’m glad to know you as a friend.

Incidentally, in keeping with the spirit of Smarter, Faster, Cheaper, here’s a picture of the ultrasophisticated Flip camera mount that I used to record the video you see above.

Flip Cam Mount

That’s a roll of paper towels on top of two Frigidaire water filter boxes. 🙂 David has taught me well!

Rizzo Tees Featured In New David Meerman Scott Book “Real-Time Marketing & PR”

It all started with a HARO request. I’d heard of David Meerman Scott, having read his book The New Rules of Marketing and PR (Amazon affiliate link). So I was quite excited to see him asking for sources on marketing in “real-time.” I’ve been doing my best to do just that since Rizzo Tees went live in October 2008.

I responded to the request, did a phone interview with David, and the rest is history. Rizzo Tees has a page in David’s new book Real-Time Marketing and PR! (Amazon affiliate link)

Real-Time Marketing And PR book

Big thanks to David for including me in his latest masterpiece. Make sure you read this book – you’ll take a ton away from it. I sure did.

Real-Time Marketing & PR – David Meerman Scott – Book Review

A few years ago, I had the good fortune to stumble across David Meerman Scott‘s book “The New Rules of Marketing & PR.” I don’t even remember how I first heard of the book. I checked it out from the library and read it on vacation. I took so much from the book that, earlier this year, I ordered the second edition and read it too. I’ve learned and applied so much from this book, and its lessons are still very valid today.

However, since David first advocated for generating inbound leads by writing a blog, and using press releases to communicate directly with your audience, things have sped up even further. Now, your customers are online, talking to you and about you in real-time. If you’re not listening and interacting, the silence is deafening. Do you want consumers to define your product on Twitter, Facebook, and the blogosphere, or do you as a company want to play a role by interacting with them? Further, do you want that engagement to result in more sales?

Enter David’s new book Real-Time Marketing and PR (Amazon affiliate link). In it, he lays out how companies are winning by engaging their customers directly online in real-time. He talks about:

  • developing a business culture that encourages speed over sloth
  • reading buying signals as people interact with you online
  • crowdsourcing product development
  • charging more for your product by delivering it faster

I’ve been a big fan of David’s for years, and I’m proud to say that my little t-shirt company, Rizzo Tees, is actually featured in the book! Flip to page 118 and read about how I like to interact with folks on Twitter, and how I crowdsource some of my t-shirt designs (especially when I’m stumped).  Thanks to David for hearing my story and incorporating it into this amazing book.

Real-Time Marketing And PR book

I highly recommend that companies of all shapes and sizes grab this book and give the principles of real-time online interaction and engagement a chance. Fear not, Corporate America. We consumers have a great deal to offer you besides our money.

Get the hardcover version here (Amazon affiliate link)

Get the Kindle version here (Amazon affiliate link)

Redonkulously shameless: get that Foursquare t-shirt I’m wearing in the video here