After my previous post about the fact that I only read one book each year, you will be surprised to hear that in the last 3 days I have read another book, cover to cover. What????!!!!????!!!
Well, it is a fast read, so that really helps. And the topic was super interesting, which is also very helpful. I dedicated some of my blog work hours to reading this book, and that was time well spent. The book is called Return on Relationship
While this book is ideally suited for businesses, there are still LOTS of nuggets of wisdom for bloggers to glean. Since my professional background has nothing to do with marketing, PR or social media, I am always eager to learn more about the ways people in these industries think (or should think) so that I can be a better compliment to them in my blog work.
Ted and Kathryn emphasize in Return on Relationship that we have sort of come full circle in the type of marketing that works. For a long time it was personal, individual, and relationship-based. Then it became about the spray and pray effect, where information was blasted as far and wide as possible, and customers were told what to think and how to feel.
Social media has turned the Mad Men marketing world on its head, and the smartest brands are devoting a lot of time now to individual relationships and to listening more. Only this time, when a customer is “listened to” (via Twitter or Facebook, for example) hundreds, if not THOUSANDS of other customers are watching.
It is intimate, yet magnified. And that means that you’d better get it right!
I read Return on Relationship with my highlighter in hand and marked several different things to go back to so I could chew on them more and let that wisdom sink in. For a book that is shy of 130 pages, it packs a lot of great stuff in there. And you can snag it on Amazon
I received a complimentary copy of Return on Relationship for review purposes. All thoughts and opinions expressed here are strictly my own. This post contains affiliate links.