Buzzmarketing: Get People to Talk About Your Stuff (Hardcover)

~ (Author) "When I worked in the corporate world of big brands, I spent millions of dollars on conventional advertising, And guess what I got?..." (more)
Key Phrases: empowered interactivity, buzz currency, percent mind share, Buzz Everest, Game Ready, Britney Spears (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Remember Half.com? Back in the days of the dotcom boom, the discount retail Web site drew headlines when it persuaded the town of Halfway, Ore., to change its name to Half.com for a year. The stunt helped the company gain millions of customers and position itself to be bought out by eBay for a handsome premium. Hughes, the brain behind Half.com's marketing ploy, extols the virtues of "buzz marketing," his name for the idea that companies can dramatically boost sales by attracting publicity and fueling widespread word-of-mouth. In this book, Hughes lays out the "principles" of buzz marketing, offering a list of dos and don'ts, plus numerous examples of businesses that outshined competitors by creating buzz. Anyone familiar with Malcolm Gladwell's The Tipping Point will grasp the logic underlying some of Hughes's ideas. He advocates getting the attention of people who can spread the gospel about your product. This approach, he says, is not only more effective than traditional advertising, but far cheaper. Hughes's tales of companies that successfully harnessed buzz are the strongest part of the book, covering businesses as diverse as Pepsi, Ben and Jerry's and Rit Dye, which revived itself by sparking the tie-dye craze in the 1960s. How valuable readers find some of his other case studies will depend on whether they agree that Britney Spears and American Idol represent "great products" marketed shrewdly. Hughes, who worked for PepsiCo and Pep Boys before joining Half.com, now runs a consulting firm that teaches companies about buzz marketing, which no doubt explains why his writing sometimes seems as subtle as a PowerPoint presentation and as gung-ho as an infomercial. Still, Hughes's ideas are provocative and should interest business professionals frustrated with same-again advertising campaigns.
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Review

A business book that’s entertaining and useful for big brands and start- ups alike. -- Steve Forbes, Editor in Chief, Forbes

There’s fake corporate marketing and then there’s real marketing. This is the real stuff for real people. -- Ben Cohen, cofounder, Ben and Jerry’s

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Portfolio Hardcover; 1 edition (July 7, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1591840929
• ISBN-13: 978-1591840923
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.2 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (40 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #345,485 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

51 of 55 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars How to Get People Talking and Buying, July 12, 2005

By	Craig L. Howe "The Pointed Pundit" (Darien, CT United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

This book offers a practical guide to the art of creating buzz.

The author, Mark Hughes, was a vice president of marketing at online retailer Half.com. Using a small advertising budget he drove his company's number of users from zero to 8 million in three years. His secret: he transformed the company into a magnet to media attention. He accomplished this coup by persuading the town of Halfway, Ore. to rename itself [...]

According to the author there are six buttons to creating great word-of-mouth campaigns:

1. The taboo - sex, lies, and bathroom humor.
2. The unusual.
3. The outrageous.
4. The hilarious
5. The remarkable.
6. The secret - both the revealed and unrevealed.

Understanding that, the author says, there are six steps to creating a campaign:

1. Push the right button.
2. Capture the media.
3. Advertise for attention.
4. Climb the mountain.
5. Discover creativity.
6. Police your product.

If your company has millions of dollars to spend on advertising, this book will be of little use. However, if money is tight and everything to lose, time spent studying this well-written book could place you and your product in the forefront of your target buyer's mind.

12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Press Agentry in the 21st Century, September 26, 2005

By	Michael J Edelman (Huntington Woods, MI USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

What Mark Hughes calls "Buzz Marketing"- getting people to talk about your product- has been with us since people slipped the Town Crier a few extra quid to mention their nostrums in his mightly rounds. Call it flacking, press agentry or what have you, it's the art of getting people to do your advertising for you by creating a story that keeps your product in the public eye.

What Hughes has done in "Buzzmarketing" is to collect a number of stories about how various marketers, including himelf, have used ways other than direct advertising to get people talking about their products. It's not a manual of how to create a buzz, but rather just a selection of interesting stories about how other did it. Creative types will no doubt find inspiration here, but those looking for a how-to guide will be disappointed. An interesting read for anyone curious about marketing.

12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Book, July 8, 2005

By	Randy Given (Manchester, CT USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

This is an excellent book. If you want your marketing to truly grow, check it out. No matter what size your business is or how varied your market.

As the author points out in the introduction, the goal is to out-think instead of out-spend. Unfortunately, that has become just another buzzword for most companies. Kinda like "world class" has become -- nearly meaningless. Not so with this book. It really has some thought provoking approaches.

Many of us know little facts that the book points out, like the fact that word of mouth is ten time more effective than TV or print advertising. I don't want to give too much away (read the book!), but it is not buzzmarketing if people don't want to talk about it.

There were so many points that I agreed with the author. I kept nodding my head and wishing other marketers would have a clue. Like the author says "most people simply don't pay attention to advertising". How true.

I rarely mark in my books, at least since college, but this one got many notations in the side columns. One of the little secrets (well, it seems to be a secret) is that companies that treat their employees well often get much better buzzmarketing from their employees and their products sell better.

The book is easy to read and presents new information effortlessly. It passed a couple of my quick tests. One is whether I could finish it in a cross-country flight (yes). Another is whether I would WANT to finish it (yes). Another is whether I would recommend it to my friends (yes).

Even if you are not marketing your own wares or those of your company, this book will help you appreciate what really gets things going ... buzzmarketing.