Herd: How to Change Mass Behaviour by Harnessing Our True Nature

Can you explain the explosion of social phenomena like text messaging when there has been little or no promotion of the behaviour? How a Mexican wave happens? The emergence of online communities? Or – more sensitively – the steady rise of floral roadside tributes to traffic accident victims?
Unless you have a good explanation of mass behaviour, you won’t have much chance of altering it. This is why so many government initiatives struggle to create real change, why so much marketing money fails to drive sales, why most M&A programmes reduce shareholder value and most internal change projects don’t deliver lasting transformation.
Herd explains the ‘why’ of our struggles to influence mass behaviour. It reveals that most of us in the West have misunderstood the mechanics (the ‘how’) of mass behaviour because we have misplaced notions of what it means to be human. Mark Earls uses a diverse range of different sources, anecdotes and evidence – from Peter Kay and urinal etiquette to international rugby and rise of the Arctic Monkeys – to show that we are at heart a ‘we–species’, but one suffering from the ‘illusion of I’.
In doing so, Earls challenges some of our deepest ideas to reveal the truth about who we are and what marketers, managers and governments can do to set about influencing mass–behaviour. Bold in its conception and engaging in its execution, Herd offers the most radical new theory of consumer behaviour in a generation.

Spis treści:
Dedication.
Foreword by Russell Davies.
Acknowledgements.
Introduction.
Part One: A ‘We–Species’ with an illusion of ‘I’.
1: The Super–Social Ape.
2: The Illusion of ‘I’.
3: ‘I’ vs. ‘Us’.
Part Two: The Seven Principles of Herd Marketing.
4: Key Principle No. 1: Interaction.
5: Key Pr inciple No. 2: Infl uence.
6: Key Principle No. 3: Us–Talk.
7: Key Principle No. 4: Just Believe.
8: Key Principle No. 5: (Re–)Light the Fire.
9: Key Principle No. 6: Co–Creativity.
10: Key Principle No. 7: Letting Go.
Part Three: Making Sense of the Herd.
11: Conclusions.
Postscript.
And it’s goodnight from him . . . .
Endnotes.
Index.

Nota biograficzna:
Mark Earls is one of the world’s foremost communications practitioners and a leading thinker about brands, marketing and consumer behaviour. He has been described variously as ‘one of the Advertising scene’s foremost contrarians” and ‘the Christopher Hitchens of advertising and marketing’. But mostly he just refuses to accept received wisdom and is determined to make us all think a bit harder to get better results.
He has held senior positions in some of the largest and most influential communications companies in the world – his last job was as chair of Ogilvy’s Global Planning Council, prior to which he was Planning Director at the revolutionary St. Luke’s Communications. His work has regularly won awards from his peers and is considered by many to be amongst the most influential being written today. His first book, Welcome to the Creative Age, was widely read and discussed and has been translated into several languages.
Mark is in much demand as conference speaker around the world – in recent years he has spoken in the UK, USA, Argentina, France, Estonia, Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Spain. He lives in North London but dreams of tight lines, off–drives and sunnier climes.

Okładka tylna:
Can you explain the explosion of social phenomena like text messaging when there has been little or no promotion of the behaviour? How a Mexican wave happens? The emergence of online communities? Or – more sensitively – the steady rise of floral roadside tributes to traffic accident victims?
Unless you have a good explanation of mass behaviour, you won’t have much chance of altering it. This is why so many government initiatives struggle to create real change, why so much marketing money fails to drive sales, why most M&A programmes reduce shareholder value and most internal change projects don’t deliver lasting transformation.
Herd explains the ‘why’ of our struggles to influence mass behaviour. It reveals that most of us in the West have misunderstood the mechanics (the ‘how’) of mass behaviour because we have misplaced notions of what it means to be human. Mark Earls uses a diverse range of different sources, anecdotes and evidence – from Peter Kay and urinal etiquette to international rugby and rise of the Arctic Monkeys – to show that we are at heart a ‘we–species’, but one suffering from the ‘illusion of I’.
In doing so, Earls challenges some of our deepest ideas to reveal the truth about who we are and what marketers, managers and governments can do to set about influencing mass–behaviour. Bold in its conception and engaging in its execution, Herd offers the most radical new theory of consumer behaviour in a generation.