Contagious: How to Build Word of Mouth in the Digital Age

Contagious is a really nice general book that explains why some ideas, products, and content catch on while others don’t. The author breaks it down into clear principles (like social currency, triggers, emotion, and storytelling) and illustrates them with real-world examples, which makes the theory easy to follow. What I liked most is how accessible it is—you don’t need a marketing background to understand it, yet it’s still useful if you do work in marketing or communications. It gave me practical insights I could actually apply, especially around creating content that resonates and spreads naturally. It’s not overly technical, but instead keeps you engaged with stories and examples you’ll probably remember long after reading. Overall, it’s a fast, insightful, and enjoyable read—great for anyone interested in marketing, psychology, or just understanding how influence works in everyday life.

This book is delivers valuable info in a nice easy to read, easy to understand format. The 6 STEPPS are explained with some great stories and are simple to make use of for your own products and ideas.

Just finished reading this book and I have to say it's one of the better books I have read on the subject and creating viral content. The examples are great and varied from industry to industry, it's easy to grasp and makes your brain tick with What If questions, especially if you have your own business, ideas start flowing. Contagious gives a good overview of what to and not to do. I will definitely read it again at some point and will use it as one of the main points of reference when creating content.

* The book's advice is very practical and easy to take action on. By the end I had pages of ideas on how I can implement the book's advice * Clear structure of 6 things that word of mouth, with a handy summary at the end * Concise and gets to the point * Includes interesting examples from large brands and smaller businesses

I find marketing interesting and need to learn about it more for a business I’ll be setting up shortly. This book was extremely useful to me and very easy to read. Some people have said it’s written in a too simple a way but I’d say I’m fairly average in understanding what words mean and the words Berger used made sense to me and made me understand what he wanted me to learn from him. Overall this is an excellent book and I’m very glad I bought and read it.

I love the concept of creating content that is easy to talk about and Berger breaks it down into 6 factors that contribute to creating really sharable content. These ideas are really well explained and make intuitive sense, so after the intro I couldn't wait to get into the meat of what makes these points tick and how they can be used. Berger is passionate about having testable scientific rigour to underlie his points. This was another great hook for me - things should be proven, repeatable and solid. Sadly this is where the book falls flat - because his examples are often naive or just poor science that fails to deliver on his premise. For example, he mentions an experiment to support the idea that people like to talk about themselves (I think we can all agree that people love to talk without the need for an experiment to prove it, but hey ho). The unforgivable sin is that he chooses an experiment that doesn't show that. The test asks people to take a paid survey and at some point they are given a few minutes of boring downtime. They can choose to wait it out, or they can choose to take less money for the survey but be allowed to talk about themselves during that downtime instead. The paper's authors claim that because their participants will sacrifice money to talk, it means that we find talking about ourselves so beguiling that we'll give up money to do it. All it really proves is that people will pay to avoid boredom. To back that up, many free to play videogames base their entire income on forcing people to wait or pay money to skip the wait. People find that BOREDOM abhorrent enough that they will pay to avoid it - making the game company millions of dollars. So this experiment doesn't back up his point, instead it makes you think he's trying to obsfucate the truth using SCIENCE. The book and his points are worse off for it. A few pages later Berger says things should be gamified with badges because people like to have a symbol that proves they have accomplished something - and then they share it. That's fine if it's a national medal or a Nobel prize, but digital badges passed beyond saturation point years ago. My friends' Facebook walls are clogged with foursquare and candy crush badges (and whatever else the latest games are posting on their behalf). Rather than wanting to share badges and pass them on, we're becoming hyper-aware of not spamming our friends with crap - because we know how irritating they are when they clog up our social feeds. This in itself falls foul of one of his own points - people share things that other people will think is cool to give them social capital. This point is awesome and really rings true, but it directly contradicts people's real behaviour when it comes to badges. The book is chock so full of these contradictions and shlock science that all the good stuff gets lost.

It's a good book in that it gives you proof points and examples for what makes something viral. It doesn't have groundbreaking, unthought of revelations, but it's great for adding foundation to your marketing decisions. If it had a bit more extensive primary research it would be even better, but I guess that's where " the science of sharing" comes in.

Did you know that a glass ball will bounce higher than a ball of rubber? Or that kangaroos cannot walk backward? (p. 38) You might say that such general knowledge trivia are well, trivial, but Berger does not think so. Professor Berger has set himself the task of discovering what it is that makes some things go viral – why it is that we share certain things but not others. The facts above come from under the Snapple caps. Snapple introduced them in 2002 – sales soared! But why? Berger’s answer is that we love to share things (such as weird facts) because that make us look good – it is a kind of ‘Social currency’. He has identified 6 key ingredients to ‘virality’: Social currency / Triggers / Emotion / Public / Practical value / Stories. There is a great deal here that we can use. Clearly, if students like something enough to share it, that could potentially make excellent teaching material. Strange facts (e.g. the QI books), lateral thinking problems, inspirational quotes can all make great ‘Social currency’. Some elements such as ‘Stories’ or ‘Emotion’ are obvious, but what about ‘Practical value’? Well, I like to give my teenage students diverse reading material but there is one book (‘Body Language’ by Pease) which they almost never return – they buy it off me! Why? Because it says how you can tell if someone likes you. What would happen if we gave our classes more stuff like this? ‘Triggers’ (ch. 2) is a fascinating concept. The idea is that we are more likely to do something if there are things around us that remind us of it – things that ‘trigger’ a particular thought. Berger and Fitzsimons got students to eat 25% more fruit and veggies by using this trick (p. 72). Could we do the same and get our students to study more? In the chapter on ‘Public’ Berger mentions an amazing movement (‘Movember’ – p. 138) which since 2007 has helped raise more than $ 174 million for victims of cancer worldwide. How did they do it? Well, they encourage male supporters to grow a moustache for a month! :-) People ask them why they have ruined their looks, they reply and the movement gains momentum – brilliant! (Moral 1: Costly, public commitment makes people do things – and the same goes for students! Moral 2: Incongruity works wonders! Could we use this in class perhaps?) OK – I have saved a little puzzle for the end. Q: Imagine you are about to open your Apple notebook which is in front of you. Is the logo the right way up? It should be, right? Wrong! Now open the laptop. That’s right. Now it is the right way up – for all the others to see! (Public! – p. 127).

L’auteur explique sa recette composée de 6 ingrédients différents pour créer un contenu qui se propagera le plus largement, grâce à l’effet réseau. Chaque composante de cette viralité est très bien détaillée, et toujours illustrée par des exemples concrets pour bien assimiler chaque concept. Un livre qui intéressera tous ceux qui veulent améliorer le marketing de leur produit, service, ou contenu. A vous de lire maintenant…

Probably, I have mentioned this books 10 times to friends while reading it - word of mouth. Full of examples on how to put effective marketing techniques in practice! Thanks Jonah for sharing!

I have been surprised with the deep concepts the book provides

The book gives you practical tips about what makes your content spread. The concepts are explained properly, and you can apply what he talks about to your own content. I recommend the book!

Honestly one of the best marketing books i've ever read. I brought me to some really good ideas so to me its worth every penny. The stories are fun and its definitly not a boring book.