Baked In: Creating Products and Businesses That Market Themselves (Hardcover)

~ Alex Bogusky (Author), (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

The old way of selling was to create safe, ordinary products and combine them with mass marketing. The new way is to create truly innovative products and build the marketing right in. But how does a brand make the transition from old to new? According to advertising gurus Alex Bogusky and John Winsor, it starts with the realization that the message is not the product, the product is the message. In Baked-In, they offer a step-by-step guide on how brands can adapt and thrive in this brave new world. Using these tools, Bogusky and Winsor have successfully marketed some of today’s most important brands, including Google, Nike, Microsoft, Patagonia, Toyota, and Burger King. They reveal how, through tools at hand — product design, brand history, internal collaboration — and the new tools of digital technology — YouTube and the web in general — companies can succeed in the 21st-century marketplace.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 152 pages
• Publisher: Agate B2 (October 13, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1932841466
• ISBN-13: 978-1932841466
• Product Dimensions: 7.3 x 5.1 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #10,467 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars What is marketing?, November 14, 2009

By	Steven S. Swanson (Denver, CO) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Amazon Verified Purchase

Marketing can't be directed like the old days in a command and control world that just doesn't exist, and Baked In in the perfect little book to get everyone to see how great marketing should be done today.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great read, October 8, 2009

By	Gareth Kay "Gareth Kay" (Boston, MA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Baked In is a book that nails one of the simple things many organizations, particularly ad agencies, have forgot. The worlds of product development and marketing should not be separate. In fact, you create a much more powerful business and brand when you bake marketing directly in to the product. It's about blurring the difference between product and marketing, an idea that has created things like Nike+ and Help Remedies and has revitalized brands like Domino's. And while a lot of the examples used are about physical products, there's lots of examples, and applicable thinking, of how the digital space can be used for more than interruption, destination creation and the application of old ad models, but for the creation of meaningful products and services that foster powerful conversation and communities around them.

It's a really practical read, packed full of case studies, bite size thoughts and exercises - very much, a book that encourages learning by doing. And, unlike most of its peers, it talks in plain English and doesn't overstretch the point. It's a thought provoking 150 pages rather than the usual four hundred pages to drag out an idea that might have best been served as a blog post.

5.0 out of 5 stars Worth your while!, November 4, 2009

By	jskwarek - See all my reviews

No one reading "Baked In" should assume that Bogusky and Winsor are going to divulge all their marketing secrets, but there are definite golden nuggets in this well-conceived book. Simply put, Baked In encourages companies to remember one simple rule: your product, not your marketing, is your most effective tool. Their advice is clever and succinct, and at a slim 152 pages you won't suffer information overload at its completion. I am not a business person - hell, I didn't even think I was interested in advertising - but I read Baked In with a fascination that extends well beyond the reach of the industry itself.