Consumer Behavior

Too often, textbooks turn the noteworthy details of economics into tedious discourse that would put even Joseph Stiglitz to sleep. Economics 101 cuts out the boring explanations and instead provides a hands-on lesson that keeps you engaged as you explore how societies allocate their resources for maximum benefit. From quantitative easing to marginal utility, this primer is packed with hundreds of entertaining tidbits and concepts that you won't be able to get anywhere else.

What does our desire for certainty and control have to do with our decision-making? According to behavioral economics pioneer Peter Atwater, the answer is simple: everything. In The Confidence Map, Atwater explores the hidden role of confidence in the choices we make, and why events described as being unprecedented are often entirely predictable—if we know what to look for. Using compelling stories from the past and present, Atwater shows listeners how to apply the same tools he teaches to help them make sense of complex situations and optimize strategy.

Running with Purpose is a highly engaging listen with insights, inspirational stories, and tangible takeaways for current and aspiring leaders, entrepreneurs, Berkshire Hathaway enthusiasts, and especially the 150+ million runners worldwide and those in the broader running community who continually invest in themselves and put positive energy into the world.

For the last 10 years, psychologist Sam Gosling has been studying how people project (and protect) their inner selves. By exploring our private worlds (desks, bedrooms, even our clothes and our cars), he shows not only how we showcase our personalities in unexpected - and unplanned - ways, but also how we create personality in the first place, communicate it to others, and interpret the world around us.

Corporations are broken, reflecting no purpose deeper than profit. But the tools we are relying on to fix them - corporate social responsibility, divestment, impact investing, and government control - risk making our problems worse. With lively storytelling and careful analysis, O’Leary and Valdmanis cut through the tired dogma of current economic thinking to reveal a hopeful truth: If we can make our corporations accountable to a deeper purpose, we can make capitalism both prosperous and good.

Bestselling author and futurist Mark Schaefer explains why community is a vastly overlooked marketing opportunity for most organizations. He explains how three major trends are colliding in a way that makes brand communities the future of marketing strategy.

Our world is being transformed by the Internet and the near limitless choice that it provides to consumers; tomorrow's markets belong to those who can take advantage of this. The Long Tail is really about the economics of abundance, an entirely new model for business that is just starting to show its power as unlimited selection reveals new truths about what consumers want and how they want to get it.

Slow Down, Sell Faster! does this by introducing a simple yet powerful method for buyer-focused selling that is practical, repeatable, and easily customizable. This buyer-focused approach extends to proposals and presentations, loyalty and retention, and, of course, cultivating more business. Each step in the book corresponds to a role you should adopt to meet customers’ needs at each stage of the buying process. Increasing sales is not just about learning more sales techniques; it’s about understanding the buying process - from your customer’s point of view.

In Branding Is Sex, brand dominatrix Deb Gabor explains how proper brand positioning gets your customers in the mood. In just seven short and sweet chapters, Deb covers these juicy topics and more: how the most successful brands in the world get their customers laid; how to never fail the Bullshit Test; and who your brand should hop in the sack with (and it’s not who you think).

Subscription companies are growing nine times faster than the S&P 500. Why? Because unlike product companies, subscription companies know their customers. A happy subscriber base is the ultimate economic moat. Today's consumers prefer the advantages of access over the hassles of maintenance. Simply put, the world is shifting from products to services. As the CEO of the world's largest subscription management platform, Tien Tzuo has helped hundreds of companies transition from relying on individual sales to building customer-centric, recurring-revenue businesses.

Sidestep the marketing books, courses, and even TED talks that offer hypothetical explanations that sound sensible and embrace the proven systematic approach of R.E.D. Marketing, which the recent CEO and current CMO of Yum! Brands applied to lead Taco Bell and KFC to double digit growth. This book, filled with simple frameworks and engaging stories, will help everyone in your company understand what really works for driving sustainable brand growth and business success.

An introduction for everyone. Rather than a "how to" for hands-on techies, this book - now in its revised and updated edition - serves lay listeners and experts alike by covering new case studies and the latest state-of-the-art techniques. In this rich, fascinating, and surprisingly accessible introduction, leading expert Eric Siegel reveals how predictive analytics works and how it affects everyone every day.

Brainfluence explains how to practically apply neuroscience and behavior technology and behavior research to better market to consumers by understanding their decision patterns. This application, called neuromarketing, studies the way the brain responds to various cognitive and sensory marketing stimuli. Analysts use this to measure a consumer's preference, what a customer reacts to, and why consumers make certain decisions.

The Psychology of Advertising offers a comprehensive exploration of theory and research in (consumer) psychology on how advertising impacts the thoughts, emotions, and actions of consumers. It links psychological theories and empirical research findings to real-life industry examples, showing how scientific research can inform marketing practice.

Whether you're a manager, owner, or employee, Customer Service Training 101 gets you up to speed fast. The completely revised and updated third edition addresses every aspect of face-to-face, phone, online, social media, and self-service interactions. Using scenarios, guidelines, and practice exercises, this inspiring training manual explains what to say and do, what to avoid, and why interactions go astray.

As a small-business owner, entrepreneur, or marketer, are you absolutely certain that you know what your customer wants? And even if you know what your customer wants, are you sure that you are able to clearly communicate that you offer the exact thing that they are seeking? In this best-selling book, Ryan Levesque lays out his proven, repeatable, yet slightly counterintuitive, methodology for understanding the core wants and motivations of your customer.

Written in the trenches of helping hundreds of B2B SaaS businesses, The Pricing Roadmap will help you pour gasoline on the fire of your pricing. Ditch the guesswork with this step-by-step guide to designing SaaS pricing that grows your business—whether you’re a startup, prerevenue venture, or an established market leader.

Books, baseball cards, ceramic figurines, art, iPhones, clothing, cars, music, dolls, furniture, and even nature itself. If you're like most people, at some point in your life you've found yourself indulging in a love affair with some thing that brings you immense joy, comfort, or fulfillment. Why is it that we so often feel intense passion for objects? What does this tendency tell us about ourselves and our society? Dr. Aaron Ahuvia presents astonishing discoveries that prove we are far less “rational” than we think when it comes to our possessions and hobbies.

K-beauty has captured imaginations worldwide by promising a kind of mesmerizing perfection. Its skincare and makeup products—creams packaged to look like milkshakes or pandas, and snail mucus face masks, to name a few—work together to fascinate us, champion consumerism, and invite us to indulge. In the four years Elise spent in Seoul as NPR’s bureau chief, the global K-beauty industry quadrupled. Today it's worth $10 billion and is only getting bigger as it rides the Hallyu wave around the globe.

This is the kind of book that you don’t read once; you read it forever.—Jay Baer, president of Convince and Convert and author of Hug Your Haters: How to Embrace Complaints and Keep Your Customers Social media has changed customer service forever. It has shifted power from brands to consumers, requiring a different way of thinking about customer engagement. Dan Gingiss has interviewed dozens of business leaders on his podcast, Focus on Customer Service. From those conversations and his own real-world experience at multiple Fortune 300 companies, Gingiss has developed a series of best ...