Author: Kramer, Bryan J.

Publication Year: 2015

Media Type: Book

Summary:

As modern marketing becomes increasingly technology-based, it’s important to remember that the tech is a means to an end: sharing stories, information, and emotion to make a human connection. Shareology explores the history of sharing and how it will continue to drive value in the future.

Abstract:

"Sharing is a fundamental human behavior central to our survival as a human race. Whether we’re sharing stories, processes, insights, philosophies, techniques, or secrets, it’s how we connect to each other and advance as a society.

Now with technologies like the Internet, video, social media, and mobile, sharing has increased its ease and scale to a global level. Information is no longer confined to geographical boundaries; proximity is no longer required to pass information from one human to another.

This radical shift requires an understanding of how these technologies have impacted, and will continue to impact, our global society. Without this understanding of sharing patterns and analyzing what will resonate with other humans, ideas will be lost and change will be stifled.

How, what, why, and where we share as individuals in our new connected technological world has the power to influence and to effect change worldwide. After thirty thousand years of sharing information in the same way, yet faced in the last twenty years with the emergence of technologies that connect global tribes together, humans need to rethink the way we share ideas as a global community.

Now yes, this is all important to our communities, countries, and world. But the truth is, on a much more personal level, sharing saved my career.

After ten years as president of a Silicon Valley marketing firm, I was lost. I couldn’t understand why; our multimillion-dollar business was thriving, showered with awards and global press. The operations, finance, and business development divisions were well-oiled machines. I found myself without a place to contribute to my own company. People were excited and eager to be a part of our business—everyone but me.

I contemplated quitting. I didn’t have a purpose.

Desperate to connect to something, I found an unexpected kinship with social media. I don’t care much for crowds or large groups of people; in fact, I am an introvert by nature, regaining my energy by being alone or with a trusted few. But over time I realized that social media gave me vast platforms to share my voice, my ideas, my contributions to anything and anyone—and people listened. They engaged, and I found myself wanting to figure out why. For three years I deconstructed these platforms and tried to understand why some ideas took off like wildfire and others died on the vine. I started to recognize patterns in sentiment and the importance of timing in making an idea explode into reality; and I connected and became social friends with some of the most inspirational thinkers in the world.

This experience profoundly affected my life, and it’s what I chose to talk about when IBM asked me to speak at their TED (Technology, Entertainment and Design) event. More about that later.

Following the twists and turns of social philosophy and technology has made me an authentic leader and ushered me into what I believe is my destiny: to share what I’ve learned with others and change the way we think about communicating with one another.

So let’s dive right into Shareology." [Part 1, p. 1-3]

Arts & Intersections:

Categories: Marketing and Communications