An interactive marketing manual that effectively encourages new methods while demonstrating them.
Consultant Schaefer delivers a bold manifesto on why human audacity has the ultimate advantage over AI.
In an era in which people and companies are using artificial intelligence to flood the digital landscape with automated content, Schaefer argues that the true competitive advantage lies not in outsmarting AI, but in “out-humaning it.” His latest work is a rallying cry for marketers, entrepreneurs, and brand experts to embrace “audacity” as their greatest asset in an oversaturated market. Schaefer begins by asking “What does it take for your product to be discovered today?” His answer unfolds through an exploration of brands, agencies, and individuals who’ve defied convention and, according to the author, have turned marketing into an art form. The book features case studies from innovative advertising companies and brands such as Giant Spoon, the Taboo Group, e.l.f. Beauty and HBO, among others, and it showcases how fearless creativity—not algorithms—captures attention and builds lasting loyalty. Through a mix of case studies and strategic insights, the author explores how what he calls “audacious” marketing can capture consumer interest and keep it. The book notes three critical pillars of brand storytelling: the narrative, the platform, and the storyteller. Using real-world examples, Schaefer illustrates how to “disrupt stories” and “[twist] them into new spaces,” rather than relying on predictable, “safe” marketing. One of the book’s key concepts is “everyday awe,” which involves creating small but profound moments of wonder that can potentially turn passive customers into brand advocates. To that end, Schafer uses an intriguing strategy that effectively follows his book’s own advice: He includes QR codes that lead readers to videos and additional case studies, among other things, which turn reading the book into a more interactive journey. By the same token, the text also includes 19 bolded words that form a “magical phrase,” rewarding readers who engage with the game. In these ways, this playful guide delivers dozens of tips for eager market executives in offbeat ways.
An interactive marketing manual that effectively encourages new methods while demonstrating them.Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2025
ISBN: 9798987245774
Page Count: 290
Publisher: Schaefer Marketing Solutions
Review Posted Online: Feb. 10, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Alternately admiring and critical, unvarnished, and a closely detailed account of a troubled innovator.
A warts-and-all portrait of the famed techno-entrepreneur—and the warts are nearly beyond counting.
To call Elon Musk (b. 1971) “mercurial” is to undervalue the term; to call him a genius is incorrect. Instead, Musk has a gift for leveraging the genius of others in order to make things work. When they don’t, writes eminent biographer Isaacson, it’s because the notoriously headstrong Musk is so sure of himself that he charges ahead against the advice of others: “He does not like to share power.” In this sharp-edged biography, the author likens Musk to an earlier biographical subject, Steve Jobs. Given Musk’s recent political turn, born of the me-first libertarianism of the very rich, however, Henry Ford also comes to mind. What emerges clearly is that Musk, who may or may not have Asperger’s syndrome (“Empathy did not come naturally”), has nurtured several obsessions for years, apart from a passion for the letter X as both a brand and personal name. He firmly believes that “all requirements should be treated as recommendations”; that it is his destiny to make humankind a multi-planetary civilization through innovations in space travel; that government is generally an impediment and that “the thought police are gaining power”; and that “a maniacal sense of urgency” should guide his businesses. That need for speed has led to undeniable successes in beating schedules and competitors, but it has also wrought disaster: One of the most telling anecdotes in the book concerns Musk’s “demon mode” order to relocate thousands of Twitter servers from Sacramento to Portland at breakneck speed, which trashed big parts of the system for months. To judge by Isaacson’s account, that may have been by design, for Musk’s idea of creative destruction seems to mean mostly chaos.
Alternately admiring and critical, unvarnished, and a closely detailed account of a troubled innovator.Pub Date: Sept. 12, 2023
ISBN: 9781982181284
Page Count: 688
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Sept. 12, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2023
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Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our...
A psychologist and Nobel Prize winner summarizes and synthesizes the recent decades of research on intuition and systematic thinking.
The author of several scholarly texts, Kahneman (Emeritus Psychology and Public Affairs/Princeton Univ.) now offers general readers not just the findings of psychological research but also a better understanding of how research questions arise and how scholars systematically frame and answer them. He begins with the distinction between System 1 and System 2 mental operations, the former referring to quick, automatic thought, the latter to more effortful, overt thinking. We rely heavily, writes, on System 1, resorting to the higher-energy System 2 only when we need or want to. Kahneman continually refers to System 2 as “lazy”: We don’t want to think rigorously about something. The author then explores the nuances of our two-system minds, showing how they perform in various situations. Psychological experiments have repeatedly revealed that our intuitions are generally wrong, that our assessments are based on biases and that our System 1 hates doubt and despises ambiguity. Kahneman largely avoids jargon; when he does use some (“heuristics,” for example), he argues that such terms really ought to join our everyday vocabulary. He reviews many fundamental concepts in psychology and statistics (regression to the mean, the narrative fallacy, the optimistic bias), showing how they relate to his overall concerns about how we think and why we make the decisions that we do. Some of the later chapters (dealing with risk-taking and statistics and probabilities) are denser than others (some readers may resent such demands on System 2!), but the passages that deal with the economic and political implications of the research are gripping.
Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our minds.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-374-27563-1
Page Count: 512
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Sept. 3, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2011
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