Cant Buy Me Like, Doug Levy
Cant Buy Me Like, Doug Levy
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Can't Buy Me Like
How Authentic Customer Connections Drive Superior Results

Author: Doug Levy, Bob Garfield

Narrator: Lee Han

Unabridged: 6 hr 28 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Ascent Audio

Published: 04/09/2013


Synopsis

Today’s brands face an apparent choice between two evils: continue betting on their increasingly ineffective advertising or put blind faith in the supposedly mystical power of social media, where “likes” stand in for transactions and a mass audience is maddeningly elusive. There has to be a better way . . .

As Lennon and McCartney wrote a half century ago, money can’t buy you love. But in today’s world, where people have become desensitized—even disillusioned—by ad campaigns and marketing slogans, that maxim needs an update: Money can’t even buy you like.

That’s because we’ve entered the “Relationship Era,” where the only path for businesses seeking long-term success is to create authentic customer relationships. Not through hip social media promo­tions, viral videos or blizzards of micro-targeted online ads. Those tactics, which simply disguise old ways of thinking with new technology, just don’t work in the long run.

So what does work in this bewildering new era? Honesty. Transparency. Shared values. A purpose beyond profit. Sure you still need a high-quality product or service to offer, but that’s not enough. Now that people can easily discover everything that’s ever been said about your brand, you can’t manipulate, seduce, persuade, flatter or entertain them into loyalty. You have to treat them like flesh-and-blood human beings, not abstract consumers or data points on a spreadsheet.

It may sound like the woo-woo language of self-help books and inspirational wall posters. But as Garfield and Levy show in this audiobook, it’s the deadly serious reality of business in the 2010s. It’s why General Motors abandoned its $10 million annual budget for Facebook ads, and why some brands have hurt themselves badly on social media by nagging, interrupting, abusing and generally ticking off their customers.

Blending powerful new research, fascinating examples and practical advice, Garfield and Levy show how any company can thrive in the Relationship Era.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Chris

I listened to the audio book and it's very good. The authors premise is that relationships with customers are more important than marketing to them in order to get them or persuade them to buy. Essentially, developing a relationship will generate more sales than sales gimmicks or a hard sale approac......more

Goodreads review by HCPLKY

Garfield and Levy believe that traditional marketing and advertising is no longer the most effective way to gain and keep customers. Instead they claim the easiest way to attract people to your product or service is to foster a relationship with your customers. The authors offer real-life examples o......more

Goodreads review by Joshua

The author argues that since we are in a new era of marketing, businesses should think about start not from a foundation of money but relationships. We are in the Relationship Era. All marketing ideas and implementations should funnel through that paradigm. I loved the book. Being fresh to the busin......more

Goodreads review by Augie

"Can't Buy Me Like" is a new, very worthwhile book from Bob Garfield, well known ad critic and co-host of NPR's On The Media, and Doug Levy, founder and CEO of creative and strategic agency MEplusYOU. This is the book every CEO should read, every marketer should ponder and every social media profess......more

Goodreads review by Rebecca

This is by far the best book on marketing I've ever read, and might be the best book on business in general. Extremely practical advice, written is a very funny, entertaining style. I read this in one sitting, and afterwards I wrote a list of things to go do differently because of what I learned. Ha......more