Preface
We won't lie. This was a hard book to write.
You see, at Brains on Fire, we believe that we owe it to our courageous customers to spend most of our time and efforts finding and sharing their passion conversation and growing their tribes. As people who practice word of mouth marketing, just finding time to write this book was a really, really big deal.
We burned some serious late-night oil.
But it was worth it because we learned so much along the way. And we grew even closer to our customers. We had someone ask us the other day, “Aren't you afraid you're giving away your secrets?” We smiled and said, “Nope.” See, we don't believe there are any marketing secrets. We've learned that sharing and connecting with other like-minded people in the world is what's magical these days. By sharing knowledge with others, we've learned good things will happen.
Our first book, Brains on Fire: Igniting Powerful, Sustainable, Word of Mouth Movements (yes, Brains on Fire is the name of our company and our first book) was a really remarkable ride. It connected us with some super-cool people. Some of those people have become our friends and kindred spirits. Some of them knocked on our door and joined our tribe. Some we're honored to call our customers and advocates. You'll get to meet a lot of them in the following pages.
Consider this book a continuation of the lessons we shared in our first book. Here's a quick review:
Movements aren't about the product conversation; they're about the passion conversation.
They start with the first conversation.
They have inspirational leadership.
They have a barrier of entry.
They empower people with knowledge.
They create a feeling of shared ownership.
They have powerful identities.
They live both online and offline.
They make advocates feel like rock stars.
Many times they find and fight an injustice.
And most importantly, movements get results.
We love hearing people recite these lessons back to us. We love it when they let us know how they have applied some of them to their own businesses. And you'll absolutely see the lessons from our last book brought to life throughout these pages. Still, we knew we had learned more in the three years since our first book was published, and we wanted to spend some time digging deeper. We felt that we owed it to our readers, our customers, and ourselves.
We're big believers in the notion that writing (and speaking) inspires thinking, and writing this book and telling these stories has truly been a gift to us. We've talked to many wise and wonderful people including our customers, their customers, and even each other. Writing this book and having these conversations has helped us really think about the work we're doing in the world and define what matters. It has helped us grow. It has opened our hearts, and helped us fall even deeper in love with the people we serve.
Our only hope is that it does a little bit of the same for you.
With LOVE always,
Robbin, Greg, Geno, and John
(and the entire Brains on Fire tribe)
When you have a book with four authors, you have to make some style decisions. So just like several other author teams have opted to do, we talk about ourselves in the third person. Please know that none us ever, ever, ever refers to ourselves in the third person when you're actually with us face-to-face. (Geez, that's weird when people do that.) We did it here to make it easier to follow. You'll even see us quote ourselves. Think of it this way: We simply decided to let you inside our walls and let you listen in on our passion conversations: conversations with our clients, our teammates, some smart people we know, and even among ourselves. Enjoy. And do us a favor: Please reach out to us and let us know what you think. You can find us thinking out loud most days on our blog at www.brainsonfire.com.
