My 6th grade English teacher assigned our class a book report assignment and I remember fondly the book that I chose. I don’t remember my teacher’s name, but I remember the book. Our teacher said that we could pick any book we wanted to read and I thought I’d be smart and pick Tolkien’s The Hobbit because I had already read it. I zipped through the book and then learned from a friend that Tolkien had also written The Lord of the Rings trilogy. That was more than 32 years ago and I fell in love with Tolkien’s books, but, more importantly, I fell head over heels in love with reading.
With my mom having gone through a rough divorce from my father a few years earlier and our moving into my grandparents’ house, I needed some place to find stability and solace. Reading became my balm to soothe me and help me see the world from a different perspective. I read about hobbits and goblins and great power that corrupted, but through it all, if you were true of heart, you could defeat evil and live to see a happy day--pretty powerful stuff to read for a young boy awkward in my own body. Lanky and tall, I didn’t fit in with the jock crowd or the popular crowd so I fell into the loner crowd, doing my own thing until I slowly began to make friends in my new neighborhood.
Looking back at that time, I had no idea of the power that reading had over me and how wonderful it was to find a stable and trustworthy skill that could help me cope with my problems. For a while, I could escape the world and all of its unfairness and dream of being somewhere else far away. But what amazed me the most, is that you could be rewarded for using your imagination. If you worked hard enough, you could write books and make a living off of it. And so I started writing short stories and adventures for my friends and I to play in our Dungeons & Dragons games.
Years have passed and I think I’ve read the Lord of the Rings trilogy around 9 times. I’ve lost count over time, having last read the series when the Peter Jackson films came out. Now I have children and hope that one day that my kids will want to read those books, but I don’t think that they will. My son isn’t into magic and swords like I was, but that’s okay because he is finding his own books to read.
What I find amazing is that 25% of Americans didn’t read a book in 2012. That’s a bit mind boggling to me. What do these people do instead? For me, I love reading and wish that I could make more time to do it. I often get to read at night before bed but I read a few pages and then conk out. Being a writer, I have to juggle writing, reading, and work along with family life and exercise. My days are often jam packed and I look back fondly when I could just pick up a book and read for hours. That doesn’t happen now because of my schedule, but I try to work in as many books as I can.
The explosion of ebooks has helped since it’s a lot easier now for me to carry so many different books with me no matter where I am. If I have my phone, I have all my books. No longer do I have to lug around a thick Harry Potter book, but part of me does miss the badge of honor I’d feel when I’d be reading that book on the train headed to work and I’d see so many others doing the same thing.
On what devices you can read has revolutionized the publishing industry, but it’s only strengthened my love of books. So I now ask you: If you had to pick one book that changed your life and you remember so fondly, what would it be? I’m curious. Leave a comment and share with me.
Ron Vitale is the author of the fantasy novel Cinderella's Secret Diary who hopes that his kids will grow up to fall in love with reading as much as he has.
Review: "What's the Future of Business?" by Brian Solis
If you're a regular reader of my blog, you might ask: "Why should I care about this?" It's extremely simple: The future of business is here, and if you're a consumer, then you'll be happy with what Solis discusses in his new book. If you're a marketer, you just might be scared to death if you're not already changing how you work.
Early in the book, Solis includes a list of companies that have not survived: Borders, Compaq, Kodak, LIFE, Tower Records, Woolworth . . . The list goes on. All of these companies were not able to survive in the changing economic climate and what gives me hope is that at the core of Solis' book is his belief that: "The experience people have with your product, your company, your representatives, define the brand through the expressions they share. Your work must focus on expressions, not impressions."
To boil that down, it's the experiences that people have with your brand that's important. Fellow authors out there might want to take note: It's how we're engaging our readers that is important and the experience around how our books are discovered that's essential to the new business.
Case in point: In the traditional way of marketing, a company has a massive mailing list and they would send out print materials, email blasts and work with the advertising department to buy print and TV ads.
Today customers are talking about products on their own on social platforms. When they want a recommendation for a book, restuarant, service, etc., they reach out to their friends and family on Facebook or Yelp. And whatever information they have on the subject, that's how a brand is going to be relevant or not.
A great example that Solis gives in his book is Burberry's social transformation. Burberry has been around for 150 years and Angela Ahrendts, Burberry CEO, made a decision that revolutionized how Burberry works as a company leveraging digital and social platforms. Ahrendts explained that:
"We had a vision, to be the first company that was fully digital end-to-end. The experience would be that a customer has total access to Burberry, across any device, anywhere. They get exactly the same feeling of the brand and feeling of the culture, regardless of how, when and where they were accessing the brand. Everyone can come to Burberry World and understand the journey and mission that Burberry is on."
Ahrendts' statement is bold and visionary. Because of new technology, change in business is happening faster than corporations can adapt. The opportunity here is to engage people on a human level. Companies cannot simply throw up a Facebook page and then boast that they have thousands of "likes." That doesn't mean anything and doesn't translate to good strategy. No, what matters is that corporations are listening to their consumers and interacting with them in real time. The experience that customers are having is rewarding to them and taking place in various digital environments. Change is here now and Solis' book lays out a solid plan for how to move forward so that we can also be nimble and adapt like Burberry.
As a consumer, I was happy to read Solis' suggestions to corporations on how best to engage me. And as an author, I obtained more insight into how I can be more relevant and obtain more of a readership for my novels. I also took a lot to heart on how I can best use what I learned for my job in electronic communications at Temple University.
The book is filled with great examples, but at its core, reading this book is an extremely unique experience. The table of contents, the layout, graphs and how the text is proportioned in bite-sized pieces reflects a unique visionary approach. I was able to ask Solis about the physical makeup of the book and he confirmed that he had specifically planned the book to be special in ts design. To read the book, is to experience it (as odd as that might sound).
If you're willing to learn about how we need to change how businesses market to consumers, this book is priceless. I've been sharing this book with coworkers, fellow writers and even have talked about this book with members of my own family over the dinner table. It's a book that aks to be discussed. In a modern economy that's not been strong, the path is clear on how we can adapt and learn new skills to help us not only be competitive in today's workforce, but also agents of change. Buy this book. Pick it up, experience it and then be prepared to talk about it because it's one of the most refreshing books I've read in a long time.