Unleashing the Ideavirus: Stop Marketing AT People! Turn Your Ideas into Epidemics by Helping Your Customers Do the Marketing thing for You.

Product Description

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

“. . .
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

“. . . 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

“Seth not only gets it, he gives it as well.
Unleashing the Ideavirus is living, livid, vivid proof.” —
Doc Searls, author, The Cluetrain Manifesto

“This is the only (idea)virus that will save you time and make you money.” —
Guy Kawasaki, CEO, garage.com, and author, Rules for Revolutionaries

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.