The book launched today. Earlier in the evening the book was ranked number two in its category on Amazon (we try harder)! Thank you to everyone who responded to our call for help and got us there.

Then Lewis Green provided one of the very first reviews of the book, vis a vis an interview on Bizsolutionsplus. Here’s what Lewis had to say:

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Dear friends, Now Is Gone has been officially released today. It’s currently available on Amazon and Bartleby Press.

Help us get started on the right track today, and make Now Is Gone number one in its category on Amazon. Our category is Computers & Internet/Business & Culture/Culture.

Thank you.

What would a book be without a launch party? Wednesday night’s elbow-to-elbow event featured some of Washington’s technology players. And it was a great opportunity to see some old friends.

Pamela Sorensen wrote up the party on Pamela’s Punch, the closest thing DC has to Valleywag. Also writing: Larissa Fair on the Buzz Bin, Shashi Bellamkonda from Network Solutions, and Presto Vivace’s Alice Marshall.

Here are some of the photos taken by Susan Rook.

Signing a book for Alina Zhukovskaya

Grandma!

Signing away. L to R: First Basket Producer David Vyorst, Bartleby Publisher Keremy Kay, Cultural Development Corp.’s Merin Frank, an emissary from Savvis, and TV Personality Kathryn Scott

Books in hand

Catching up with my old friend Kathryn

 Primer helps executives and entrepreneurs intelligently leapfrog into social media communications.

(Released on PRWeb, November 5) Bartelby Press announced today Now Is Gone: A Primer on New Media for Executives and Entrepreneurs by Geoff Livingston with Brian Solis will be available for sale on November 12.

In one sitting, the book helps business executives and communications professionals understand social media and how to integrate it into the marketing mix:

• Introduces Social Media, the benefits, and the importance of engaging with influencers and customers directly
• Explains the new culture of two-way conversational marketing
• Inspires and shapes social media strategies to successfully engage communities
• Highlights some of the more common social media promotion tools
• Reveals cultural hurdles a company must face before starting social media outreach
• Provides ways to manage the rapid evolution of social networks and technologies

Some of the most revealing highlights of the book are principles that companies should adapt in their outreach if they want to be successful. The seven principles of successful community engagement are:

• Do not try to control the message: People will talk about your company with or without you. Since social media is inherently two-way, a controlling entity that enters the community will be met with anger, distrust and either rebellion or deaf ears.
• Honesty, ethics and transparencies are musts: Openness isn’t about baring trade secrets or intellectual property. Rather it focuses a company on basic human relations and creates a strong foundation for long-term, two-way mutually beneficial relationships.
• Participation within the community is marketing: Companies need to do more than blog, they need to comment and contribute to larger community groups and social networks.
• Communication to audiences is an out-dated 20th Century concept: Audiences receive one-way communications — movies, radio broadcasts, speeches, — Thanks to social media the audience is no longer the audience. People are now empowered to use social channels to voice their thoughts and opinions through publish channels creating the opportunity for dynamic communities driven by conversations.
• Build value for the community: It is only by listening, reading and understanding a community that a company can understand the unique cultures within each in order to participate and share valuable and relevant information.
• Inspire your community with real, exciting information, not corporate propaganda: Don’t waste people’s time with unnecessary product information or press releases, and instead remember to build intrinsic value.
• Intelligently manage your media forms (RSS, frequency, etc.) to build a stronger, loyal community: Intelligently creating content to build a community means making it easy and engaging for community members to come back.

Images
Book Cover and Author Photos on Flickr

Podcasts

• Participation Is Marketing
• Communities versus Audiences
• Chapter Six: Think Liquid

Quotes:
Attributed to Geoff Livingston
Our goal was to present executives and entrepreneurs a thorough primer that can be completed in one sitting. While social media represents a sea change, it does not need to be hard or difficult. The biggest change involves moving from traditional one-way mass communications to a two-way conversational approach.

Businesses must understand that social media is not going away, they have to embrace it sooner or later. They just need some tools like Now Is Gone to quickly acquire the knowledge necessary to succeed.

Attributed to Brian Solis
Social Media is about empowering people to have conversations where they take place. It starts with acknowledging that customers are people and companies are represented by people. The difference today is that it’s not about marketing “at” audiences any longer it’s about conversations between people. Social Media has empowered almost anyone to earn an influential voice, which in turn sparks conversations that have direct influence with peers. The choice is now with the companies who need to understand the significance Social Media plays in the markets of conversations and how they will participate in order to help and guide their customers.

Reviews
Back Cover
Blog Herald

About the Authors:

Geoff Livingston
Geoff is CEO of Livingston Communications. He has worked as a marketing strategist in the Washington, DC region for 14 years. Dubbed a “local blogging guru” by the Washington Post, Geoff’s Buzz Bin blog is nationally recognized, and is the top ranked independent PR blog in the Washington, DC region. He successfully launched FortiusOne’s GeoCommons using an aggressive social media strategy, and marketed Godsmack lead singer Sully Erna’s bio using a diversified My Space and blogosphere campaign.

Brian Solis
Brian is Principal of FutureWorks, an award-winning PR agency in Silicon Valley. Solis blogs at PR2.0, bub.blicio.us, and regularly contributes PR and tech commentary to industry publications. Solis is co-founder of the Social Media Club, is an original member of the Media 2.0 Workgroup, and also is a contributor to the Social Media Collective. Brian has been actively writing about new PR and the idea of PR 2.0 since the mid 90s to discuss how the Web was redefining the communications industry.

About Bartleby Press
Since 1981, Bartleby Press has been devoted to crafting books of quality that are fun to read and a pleasure to own. More information about Bartleby the Publisher is available at www.bartlebythepublisher.com.

Now Is Gone was reviewed today on Blog Herald, one of the leading publications covering the blogosphere. Author Valeria Maltoni says:

Think Liquid is the best chapter in a book that is extremely useful even for someone like me who has done plenty of marketing and has experienced social media first hand. The reality is you could be doing a lot of these things already, yet feel that you are not succeeding.

See Valeria’s companion piece on Conversation Agent for more insights into the book. And if you want to hear Think Liquid now, check out the free audio podcast of the chapter, which is under ten minutes in length.

Brian Solis and I began a series of podcasts to discuss the seven principles of community engagement uncovered in the book Now Is Gone (only 14 days until it’s released). The first podcast focuses on Audiences versus Communities (approx. 12 minutes in length).

We discuss:

• One-way communications to audiences versus two-way conversational marketing within communities
• The social media release as an example of community marketing
• The need to engage in two-way communications, even when its negative
• Jennifer McClure’s work with New Communications Review, specifically analysis of FedEx’s failure to respond to negative comments
• Jay Rosen’s article highly influential article, “The People Formerly Known as the Audience“

If you prefer to download, visit media.libsyn.com/media/geoliv/audiences.wav. Remember, the book will be released on November 12. Pre-ordering is available on Amazon. We will publish the second Now Is Gone podcast on Participation is Marketing next Monday.

 Many folks have asked for autographed copies of Now Is Gone.  You can get a Geoff Livingston autographed copy of the book directly from Bartleby Press. Bartleby is also offering a 20 percent discount ($11.95), which Amazon has yet to match.

For a Brian Solis autographed copy, you will need to contact Brian and send a copy to him. Connect with Brian on Twitter, Jaiku, Pownce or Facebook. Or you can go hear Brian speak (which he does frequently).

Per earlier discussion on this topic, in order to have Brian sign all copies he would have to fly from SF to DC, and that would cost almost $1000 including hotel. To be frank, you don’t make money on books (see Marketing Now Is Gone), and we are not eager to incur unnecessary additional expenses.

Here’s a free podcast of “Now Is Gone” Chapter Six - Think Liquid. This chapter is the conclusion of the book (now you really can skip to the end), and coaches marketers and executives on how to handle the dynamically changing social media world. Read by the author (me), the podcast is approximately nine minutes long.

If you prefer to download, visit media.libsyn.com/media/geoliv/Chapter_Six3.wav. Remember, the book will be released on November 12. Pre-ordering is available on Amazon.

We’re going to print this week. In the rush, Bartleby Press asked me to expand the afterward into a more substantive mini-chapter. As a result, new sources have been added to Now Is Gone. They are:

• Cam Beck
• Chris Brogan
• Kyle Flaherty
• Lewis Green
• Steve Spalding

You can find the original list of sources here. As with the original group, these five will be added to the sources tab, and offered a complimentary copy of the book. If you have questions about marketing the book or the use of bloggers as sources, I refer you to the prior post, “Marketing Now Is Gone.”

It only seems fitting that this post was published at 11 p.m.

It looks like November 12 will be the day that Now Is Gone will ship. We are still ironing out last edits and proofs, but it’s looking good. Once the date is 100 percent certain, we’ll issue a press release.

Autographed Copies

Several parties have asked about autographed copies. There are a couple of issues with this. With Amazon orders we have no way of knowing which book will go to which buyer. So managing the logistics with Amazon is impossible.

If you want me to autograph a copy, Bartleby Press will set up its own online purchase mechanism with a discount. I will drive to Olney, MD and autograph all copies of Now Is Gone personally. Additionally, I am planning an invite-only book signing party in the Greater Washington area.

For a Brian Solis autographed copy, you will need to contact Brian and send a copy to him. Connect with Brian on Twitter, Jaiku, Pownce or Facebook. Or you can go hear Brian speak (which he does frequently).

In order to have Brian sign all copies he would have to fly from SF to DC, and that would cost almost $1000 including hotel. To be frank, you don’t make money on books (see Marketing Now Is Gone), so we are not eager to incur unnecessary additional expenses.

Thank you for your patience with the delays to date. The publisher wants to endure you get a good product!