Jonathan Goodman, the 26-year-old author of the #1 Amazon book on marketing, today announced he is crowd-sourcing his next book ?Viralnomics,? publishing it for free on the Internet, and moving to Hawaii.
?I believe in practicing what I preach,? says Goodman.
?Viralnomics is all about understanding the psychology of the end user to harness the power of social media. You can then create powerful messages that go viral to sell your product and put you miles ahead of the competition.?
The introduction to the book is now live on the Viralnomics website .
Viralnomics draws on psychology, behavioural economics, social contagion theory and Goodman?s own experience as a personal trainer turned author, marketing expert, consultant, and web entrepreneur.
?Experts are being created with less experience and knowledge than ever before,? says Goodman. ?These days, business success is less about credentials, expertise and even quality and more about getting the right message to the right people at the right time in the right way.?
The key is getting your message to spread within a carefully selected sub group already engaged in your product or service. Marketing to potential customers not already interested in you will not create a social response. ?You don?t need an Internet video with 1,000,000 hits or a blog post to get 100,000 views overnight,? says Goodman.
?Viralnomics? teaches readers how to pick the best audience for their product and create social media messages to reach and go viral within that audience.
?It?s a new take on viral marketing that is more targeted and purposeful,? says Goodman. ?And it just might make you an expert and put your product at the top of your industry.?
Goodman believes the world is shifting away from the race to build the biggest companies with the cheapest prices, biggest outsourcing solutions, and biggest marketing messages. ?I believe that social media is once again making the world a personal place,? says Goodman.
?Viralnomics? teaches readers how to find and build the roads to connect their message to potential buyers. Goodman says there is a surprise along the way. ?The people who will share your material have been right under your nose the whole time.?
?People have no time to sift through the endless stream of marketing messages thrown at them,? writes Goodman in the introduction to Viralnomics. ?They often make buying decisions on an emotional whim. It?s irrational. But it?s the only way to cope.?
Goodman saw this all the time in his previous life as a personal trainer. People seemed to take longer deciding what restaurant to choose for dinner than to committing thousands of dollars on a personal trainer.
He wondered why.
Goodman concluded that fitness sells on emotion. So do many other products. That?s not a new idea. What is new: how easy it is to manipulate emotion to sell products by using social media.
Part of the process is telling your story succinctly using symbols. The goal is to allow the end user to have ownership over their own thoughts, even as you plant an idea in their heads.
Everybody online has a trust network. They want to show off to their trust network that they are intelligent, attractive, and funny. ?If you can help people selectively self-represent the way they want,? says Goodman, ?they will go out of the way to spread your message.?
As he publishes ?Viralnomics? online, Goodman will be incorporating feedback and suggestions from readers. Those who make voluntary donations will be promoted in the hard copy version of the completed book. They will also receive a copy of the book and personal gifts and notes from Goodman.
?As always, it?s all about connection,? says Goodman.
And Goodman should know. At age 26, he has grown from a self-described ?noboby? three years ago to a leading authority in the fitness and marketing worlds with two published books, three websites, and a successful seminar and consulting business.
His Internet career began when, as a personal trainer, he started a blog he describes as ?so bad even my mother didn?t read it.?
But Goodman’s third attempt at a blog, The Personal Trainer Development Center has become a huge success, with tens of thousands of readers around the world. It?s a collaborative resource for personal trainers that includes such free e-books as ?101 Mistakes Personal Trainers Make and How To Avoid Them.?
A Web entrepreneur was born. Next came two books: ?Ignite The Fire: The Secrets of a Successful Personal Training Career? and ?The Race To The Top: How To Take Over the Social Media Feed.? Fitness seminars and consulting clients followed. So did poking fun at his first career with his weekly web comic The Mighty Trainer .
Goodman says ?Viralnomics? is ?the culmination of everything I?ve learned to date.? He looks forward to collaborating with online readers on the book.
And he?s moving from cold Toronto to sunny Hawaii to finish the book. He?ll be blogging about the whole experience and ?maybe posting video of me struggling to learn how to play the Ukelele. Yeah ? that?s happening.?
Not bad for a 26 year old, eh?
If you want to learn more about Jon Goodman and Viralnomics, you can add him on Facebook, Twitter and check out www.viralnomics.com
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