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Conversational Capital: How to Create Stuff People Love to Talk About | 
 enlarge | Author: Bertrand Cesvet
Creators: Tony Babinski, Eric Alper
Publisher: FT Press
Category: Book
List Price: $22.99
Buy New: $10.95
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Rating:  66 reviews
Sales Rank: 229969
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1
Pages: 208
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.1
Dimensions (in): 9.1 x 6.4 x 0.9
ISBN: 0137145500
Dewey Decimal Number: 658.827
EAN: 9780137145508
ASIN: 0137145500
Publication Date: August 17, 2008
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Amazon.com Review
An Exclusive Conversation on Conversational Capital with Author Bertrand Cesvet What is the most common mistake made by individuals seeking to harness the power of word-of-mouth marketing?
All too many individuals seeking to harness the power of word-of-mouth marketing focus on the vehicles through which word-of-mouth is perpetuated, rather than the triggers of word-of-mouth to begin with. The number of times we've heard marketers yearn for a presence on social media or a user-generated content campaign is nauseating. Our response is pretty universal ~ it doesn't matter that you give your consumers a place to talk if they don't have anything good to talk about. Thus, our central message is to focus not on the tools, but on the substance of conversations. The only way to create resonant and sustained word-of-mouth is to focus on the inherent value of the experience itself. I found it interesting that Conversational Capital should not be termed "buzz." Why is this so important?
Buzz is something created around an experience rather than related to the experience itself. Let's say I put a pedometer in a box of Fruit Loops cereal and proceed to call it "healthy" because the pedometer encourages one to exercise. I've done nothing to change the experience or the nutritional value of the cereal itself - only created a stunt to project a temporal aura of "health." Do smaller companies have an advantage in building Conversational Capital?
Being small isn't necessary, but it helps. Why? Because engineering and implementing Conversational Capital requires three things: 1) the ability to be nimble, 2) the capacity to be entrepreneurial (and thus embrace some degree of risk-taking) AND 3) the foresight to take a long-term view of the development of your brand, unconstrained by investors clambering for short-term profit-taking. That being said, many large organizations have successfully preserved these three competences. Look at an organization like Southwest Airlines - the largest domestic air carrier in the US. The firm has managed to develop Conversational Capital principally because its empowered culture is by its very nature, entrepreneurial. So in essence, the ability to act small is what matters more than being small. How wary should marketers be with the double-edged sword of myth?
Myth must be rooted in some fundamental truth about the brand, the brand experience, or the brand's founding. Otherwise myth lives in the realm of lies, rather than as a story that's told and retold. Marketers can temper their wariness by ensuring that the myth(s) around their brand are continuous ~ it is continuity that keeps the cutting edge of that proverbial sword away from you. What industries do you feel are under-utilizing Conversational Capital?
Industries that view their customers with disdain or an attitude of dismissiveness. Look at the North American Air Transport sector. Airlines continue to pare service in a continuous quest for cost-cutting, thereby commoditizing themselves rather than developing the ability to build brands and extract premiums. Look too to the North American Auto Industry. It is in crisis principally because it didn't listen to the talk around its brands. And it didn't build products worthy of conversation. Many further examples exist, from education, to financial services, to telecom, to department stores. But ultimately, the realization must be apparent that not everyone can be a Conversational Capital king. But each industry should have its star(s).
Product Description
"In The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell presents an important idea without any 'how to.' Now Bertrand Cesvet provides the 'how to' you need to create 'Tipping Points' for your business and success. This book is a compelling presentation of a powerful idea. This is how the new world will do business. Highly recommended if you care about your future." Stewart Emery, coauthor of international best-seller Success Built to Last "Ultimately, magic is unexplainable. Still, Conversational Capital provides the most insightful analysis of what makes our shows ring in the heart of fans." Guy Laliberte, founder, Cirque du Soleil "Like all great ideas, Conversational Capital is at its core simple: word-of-mouth momentum can be created, harnessed, and used to build consumer passion for a brand better and more cost-effectively than almost any other marketing medium." Rupert Duchesne,CEO of Aeroplan "Marketing is an art that Conversational Capital turns smartly into science. This book provides the complete prescription for getting consumers excited about your ideas." Jim Champy, coauthor, Reenginering the Corporation, and author, Outsmart!Embed into Your Products and Experiences the Ingredients that Drive Advocacy: *Create products and services that consumers find truly significant*Intensify consumption experiences to transform your brands into market leaders*Don't settle for serendipity: manage and control the word-of-mouth around your brand by manipulating eight powerful experience amplifiers For all the books that speak of the value of consumer advocacy, few indicate how to create it to begin with. Armed with a compelling set of examples from their own work in fostering leading brands, the authors reveal the triggers of word-of-mouth and a process to embedding them in your own products, helping you create stuff people love to talk about. From Bertrand Cesvet, chairman of Sid Lee, a leading purveyor of experiential design and communications services that leverages commercial creativity for breakthrough brands including Cirque du Soleil, adidas, and Red Bull. 1% of the proceeds from the royalties earned by the authors will be donated to the One Drop Foundation. The mission of the One DropTM Foundation is to fight poverty around the world by giving everyone access to safe water.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 61 more reviews...
 Food for thought November 20, 2008
Michelf (Orange County, CA)
6 out of 7 found this review helpful
I'm an MBA student and I'm really interested in "word of mouth" and "trusted voice" sorts of marketing techniques. The idea of what we consume, how we consume, how we communicate about it to the people around us and my own experience in that is what drew me to study marketing. So this book seemed like it was really written for me. I wish I had read it before I went back to school, I would have had more to talk about in certain classes I've already taken.
The book is rather thin looking, it's less than 200 pages and that includes a glossary of terms and an index. As a result, it is a fast read and gives some really interesting examples. Unfortunately, it's a bit... "conceptual" is the word I'm going to use. What the book does is explain what Conversational Capital is, it gives you a vocabulary for ideas that you may already have but just didn't have in the front of your brain until you had a name for it.
If you're looking at this book because you want to know exactly what steps to take to generate conversational capital for your business you will probably be disappointed. But it can still be valuable to you. It's not a list of instructions it's "food for thought". And, in my experience, thinking is a really good idea.
 Amazon is already doing this! November 20, 2008
Peggy (Norfolk, VA United States)
Although I enjoyed reading about Cirque du Soleil (incredible shows-even when seen on TV), IKEA, and Schwartz's as prime examples espousing their conceptualization of "word of mouth marketing," I could not help but think Jeff Bezos must have channeled this book many years ago as when he created Amazon as he employed the "eight engines of conversational capital" and of course many other savvy business strategies to put him ahead of the pack-of course his market timing was great too. Think of all of the different types of special sales, the high percentage of repeat Amazon customers and free product reviewers as well as the relatively new Amazon Vine. WE are a tribe as defined in this book (brief mention on page 116). Most of the information contained in this book we already knew, but likely did not really think about it unless our occupation is in marketing-hence the 3 star rating. What this book does is a nice job of organizing this information into concise chapters and definitions. At only 168 pages, this is an easy, albeit somewhat of a thought provoking book that can be read in a few hours. You may even learn a bit about yourself as to why you are brand loyal and possibly consciously get others to be loyal to your product. As for myself, I realized I may have a little Amazon addiction or at least a Pavlovian conditioning to Amazon's great regular and sales prices! This is the ONLY website I check several times throughout the day. Hmmm, I may be a good example of being a "connector" consumer as denoted by this book. So I guess I did pick up a bit of new jargon.
No Clear Direction November 20, 2008
Book Addict (Midwest)
I have read nearly all of the major marketing books and I will have to confess that this book left me confused. Is it marketing? Is it branding? Is it promotion and PR? The subtitle of the book, "How to Create Stuff People Love to Talk About" never delivers. Yes, the authors must have been successful at marketing, afterall, Cirque du Soleil was/is one of their accounts. But they really only use about four business examples. And they don't really address the how, as in, how did Cirque du Soleil become such an icon and did marketing have anything to do with it? Or, as seems more likely, that the buzz was generated after the success of CdS, but contributed little to building its success. I didn't find a cause and effect in this book. Interesting reading if you have the time but certainly not a staple on the business of marketing and branding shelf.
Great Spark and Tender for Ideas November 19, 2008
Alain B. Burrese (Missoula, MT)
I found "Conversational Capital: How To Create Stuff People Love to Talk About" by Bertrand Cesvet with Tony Babinski and Eric Alper to be an interesting read. I really didn't know what to expect as I started, but the conversational style with many real life examples to illustrate the authors' points kept me interested and made me stop and think of other ideas as I read the text.
The book focuses on why certain brands outperform others. It is a study on market leaders and their products and services. Rather than just sell a product or service, the authors note that these leaders create experiences that provide fuel for conversations about the products and services being sold. The authors contend that creating such experiences is a process that can be influenced. This book will get you thinking about how you can do just that.
This is a book about creating word-of-mouth about your product or service. Word-of-mouth can be built, and can be an asset to increase the value of your brand. And as the authors point out, ignore it and it could become a liability. By studying different leading brands, the authors came up with a series of observations that help generate and spread positive word-of-mouth. They call these observations Conversational Capital. This is different from creating "buzz" about a project.
In the text, the authors describe and explain what they call the eight engines of Conversational Capital. These include Rituals, Exclusive Product Offering, Myths, Relevant Sensory Oddity, Icons, Tribalism, Endorsement, and Continuity. And while sometimes one not familiar with marketing jargon or the terms used by the authors might have to read something twice, I found the actual examples of products and services I was familiar with to be refreshing and relevant to grasping the concepts the authors were explaining.
I would agree with the authors that positive word-of-mouth results in timely, measurable results. I have seen the effect of positive word-of-mouth in my business. I also think the authors are correct when they say "people will talk." If you read this book and implement the suggestions and strategies discussed, you can make sure they are talking about you by creating experiences that are more meaningful and more likely to be talked about.
If you are selling a product or service, this book just might be the ticket to help you create something people will talk about. I would have liked to have seen a little more depth into the topic, and maybe a guide for implementing the Conversational Capital strategies, or engines, to one's business. But it does get one thinking about how to create better experiences, and this thinking should lead to implementing strategies, therefore I like the book not as a guide, but as a spark and tender to get the fire started.
Reviewed by Alain Burrese, author of Hard-Won Wisdom From the School of Hard Knocks and the dvds: Hapkido Hoshinsul, Streetfighting Essentials, Hapkido Cane, the Lock On Joint Locking Essentials series and articles including a regular column on negotiation for The Montana Lawyer. Alain Also wrote a series of articles called Lessons From The Apprentice.
 Practical, More Than Magical November 18, 2008
Benjamin Devey
Conversational Capital happens when your customers talk about you or your product. It's more than reputation or word-of-mouth. It's an aura of unique feelings that combined set you apart from the competition. The authors explain that it is more valuable than the money most companies pump into advertising. Conversational Capital makes loyal advocates of the people you do business with. Using examples such as Cirque du Soleil, IKEA, Apple, and Schwartz's deli, the authors lay out the points that create Conversational Capital. Much of the book explains the mechanics in straightforward prose that doesn't stray from the points.
When you fan through the short chapters (163 pages of text plus glossary and index), it looks like a light read. But it is abundant in information that doesn't skim over the details. It feels as if many of the points are rehearsed over several times as they're first introduced, and next shown in the context of the companies who use Conversational Capital, then finally explained in chapter detail. I was hoping for some kind of magic--perhaps in the descriptions of the aura of myth with which companies like Cirque develop a mystique, or how tribalism creates an almost-religious devotion among followers, but most of the points were explained like a classroom practicum without so much wand-waving. At the end of each chapter, prior to each summary and discussion questions, the authors include a comment box, where they put goofy remarks intended to show how they would individualize the book to create a unique experience for you, the reader. The asides come off self-indulgent rather than reader-insightful. I tested how the book would feel without the white boxes, and admittedly, the text would have seemed drier. I think I would rather have the magic spell woven throughout the narrative with colorful descriptions of the mystique each of the companies achieve, and the way customers respond to the stimuli.
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