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December 20, 2006
Citizen Marketers in the WSJ
Christmas came early for us this year: A nice review of "Citizen Marketers" in Wednesday's Wall Street Journal. (Paid subscription required.)
Can I just say that it blows our addled minds that one of the world's great newspapers wrote a 900-word review of our book? OK, enough with the schoolboy giggles.
Reviewer Frank Rose kicks off his exam by highlighting a recent video making the YouTube rounds that arrived well after our manuscript deadline:
Last month, as Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba's "Citizen Marketers" was heading toward bookstores, an unscheduled viral marketing event occurred at a private event celebrating the merger of MBNA and Bank of America. You might have seen it by now: Two pear-shaped managers with serious balding issues perform a cringeworthy rendition of U2's "One." ("And it's ONE BANK, ONE CARD, one name known all over the world....") What would have previously been endured with a groan by those present was instead recorded, doubtless by someone with a video-equipped cellphone. The clip inevitably surfaced on YouTube and ricocheted across the Internet, to global ridicule. (U2's music publisher issued a threatening letter, but that's another story.) Anyone even the slightest bit surprised at all this should drop everything and read this book.
Readers of this blog and others like it, of course, aren't surprised how things like the Bank One video spread virally, even if it did seem eerily like a real-life scene from "The Office." We wrote the book for people whom YouTube, MySpace and the universe of social media are mysterious galaxies that seem more like daunting black holes than new Trekkian worlds to explore.
Frank takes issue with our 4 F's categorization of citizen marketers; he thinks mnemonic devices are overused in business books. That's probably true, but if that's the worse thing about the book, we'll take it :) Our thanks to Frank Rose and the Journal for the review.
Other blogs that reference Citizen Marketers in the WSJ:
I've order mine of amazon in the uk and its not coming till the end of feb grr!
And now you're mocking with positive reviews!
Very nice mention guys! Planning on taking the rest of the day off? ;)
How about these 4 Fs ... Fortuitous ... Fantastic ... Fawningly ... which all leads to a Fiesta.
Fabulous coverage Ben and Jackie. And famously deserved to boot.
Kelvin -- Not until the end of February? I'm not sure why that's so. I'll see what I can find out from our publisher.
Mack -- Yeah, riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight!
John -- One more F in that list and you're going to make us look absolutely fatuous.
Awesome! I'm loving the book so far. My family can't wait to read my profile, lol :)
Kelvin (and anyone else who happens to be reading from the UK) -- Our publisher reports that books have been sent to the UK and should be available through Amazon UK sometime in early January.
Ben and Jackie: Just wanted to let you know that I recently received my copy of the book and am almost through it. Great follow up to Customer Evangelists. We are already recommending it to our staff and some of our partners as well. Congratulations:)
Congratulations! What a great start for Citizen Marketers-and it's only the beginning! Still reading away..
