Let’s Get Small* – A MicroReview

Do you talk back to books?  I do.

What I mean is – when I’m reading a book that is truly engaging, I often find myself having a conversation with the author as I go along.  Yes, sometimes this means that I’m speaking out loud as if s/he were in the room with me.  I’ve been known to startle the cat, the dog, my husband and people in coffee shops with my unexpected outbursts.

Whether the engagement is a negative one “What?! You idiot… Who let you publish a book on this?” or a positive one “Yes! Absolutely! Hah!! That’s exactly what I’ve been trying to tell people!” it doesn’t always translate to a need to let anyone outside of my immediate surroundings know about it.

But a couple of weeks ago, I got this really nice email asking me if I’d possibly be interested in participating in a chapter-review of Greg Verdino’s new book microMARKETING: Get Big Results by Thinking and Acting Small.

I’ll explain a little bit about the process further down, but first? If you don’t know who Greg Verdino is then take a second to go visit his site.  If you do know who Greg is you’ll know why I was kind of excited to be asked to join in. (I mean aside from knowing he’s the VP of Strategy for the rather awesome Powered, Inc.)

Firstly, Greg’s book has been on my “must read” list since I first heard about it.  The guy seriously gets not just Social Marketing but he sees things you’ll miss even when you’re experiencing the same events.  Secondly? My “must read” list has been lagging a bit.  Well, yeah, I’ve been lagging. I kind of figured that if I participated in this, not only would I get to share something with you that I expected was intrinsically interesting, but I’d also have a deadline that would bump it up on my ‘To Do’ List. (Not to mention get me to post something in a timely manner.)

Boy am I glad I said yes.

So the really-kind-of-cool plan that Greg & my friend Aaron Strout came up with was to go “micro” in the spirit of the book.  Instead of having a bunch of people try to review the book on a general level (you can see the Amazon reviews for that) – they hit up some people who were particularly passionate about topics that the chapters in the book covered and asked them to do a “Micro Review” by focusing on a specific chapter.  Aaron & Greg probably explain the whole idea better in their posts about it. But I’ll have a list of the other folks at the bottom of this post that I’ll update with links as they roll out.

Me? Today I’m tackling Chapter: 2 – Thinking and Acting Small: Understanding the microMARKETING mindset along with Mitch Joel.  Personally, I can’t wait to see what Mitch (and everyone else) thought.

Off to the races then, shall we?

The title of Chapter 2 is rather like a Twittered preview of exactly what you’re going to get by reading it.  It’s all about introducing the reader to the microMARKETING mindset.  But as the most convincing advocates always do, Greg chooses to follow the classic adage of “show, don’t tell” when it comes to illustrating his point.  Through case studies including Paramount Pictures, Universal Pictures, and Coca-Cola, he demonstrates why ‘thinking and acting small’ can bring about the big results that marketers are always striving for.

I’m not going to give you spoilers about how exactly he does that – after all, this is an entire chapter dedicated to getting you into the right mindset to understand the rest of the book.  It would be a disservice for me to try and summarize it here.

I will sheepishly admit that I rather believed that I didn’t need this chapter myself before I read it.  After all, micromarketing is something I’m totally passionate about.

As I said, that was before I read it.

You see, I witnessed these case studies as they happened. I suspect most of you reading this did.  They weren’t secrets.  In fact, if anything, they were headline news & much discussed as they occurred. I think I’m the only person on the planet who hasn’t seen Paranormal Activity yet.  Despite the fact that I voted for it to come to Denver.  What I didn’t see was the broader impact of what I was reading & hearing at the time as it related to mainstream marketing. Through most of this chapter, I was definitely talking out loud.  If Greg (or you) could’ve heard me? It was mostly punctuated with a series of “Ohhhhhh…”s and “Yes!! Exactly!“s.

Although there were a few “Hm. Wait. Are we going to address that later?” moments, too.  Specifically, I’d love to sit down with Greg over a Coke sometime and discuss whether ‘social serendipity’ is a viable marketing strategy or not.

But that? That’s the sign of a book I want to keep reading.

If I’m not wanting to talk back to the author, or the brand, or the creator of some form of media? I’m not engaged. But I’m seriously looking forward to reading the rest of this book. This chapter sets the stage for a deeper understanding of micromarketing as a mission critical objective for not just “the little guys” but for the global brands as well. It introduces the rest of the book in a way that just reading the chapter titles won’t. If the rest of microMARKETING: Get Big Results by Thinking and Acting Small lives up to this? I expect it to find it in my playbook long after the Facebook term for “fans” has morphed into something completely unexpected. (Yes, that’s a nod to the book.  See the footnote on page 29.)

Intrigued yet?  Me too.

So, as I said above, over the next 2 weeks, a slew of other folks will be weighing in, chapter-by-chapter.  I’ll update the links to the specific posts as I get them – but if you’re interested in following along? Here’s the schedule and links to the other sites that are weighing in.

Mon 9/20 - Chap 1	Tue 9/21 – Chap 2	Wed 9/22 – Chap 3
- Aaron Strout	- Lucretia Pruitt	- Jason Falls
	- Mitch Joel	- Toby Bloomberg
Thu 9/23 – Chap 4	Fri 9/24 – Chap 5	Mon 9/27 – Chap 6
- Katya Anderson	- Amber Naslund	- Ari Herzog
- Murray Newlands	- Marc Meyer	TBA
	- Chris Abraham
Tue 9/28 – Chap 7	Wed 9/29 – Chap 8	Thu 9/30 – Chap 9
- Danny Brown	- C.C. Chapman	- John Moore
- Jay Baer	- Elmer Boutin	- David Armano
- Adam Cohen		- Justin Levy
- Becky Caroll		- Beth Harte

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If you’ve read Greg Verdino’s microMARKETING already, what did you think? Did this chapter help you get into the mindset of the rest of the book? Did you talk back to him too? (Or is that just me…) I’d love to hear your thoughts.  If you haven’t read it yet – I’d love to know if you plan to. If not, why not?

*With many thanks to the inimitable Steve Martin whose “Let’s Get Small” remains one of my favorite comedy albums of all time for the title of this post.