As social media managers, we are in the business of influencing our audience (for the better), and understanding the psychology of persuasion is critical.

This is where Dr Robert Cialdini’s 1984 bestseller Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion comes handy to understand why people say yes to some things and no to others:

In Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion, you will learn about the six fundamental principles of persuasion:

• Reciprocity: the idea of treating someone as you are treated
• Scarcity: limiting availability to increase attractiveness
• Authority: building confidence in prospects
• Consensus: showing others that everyone else is engaging with your brand
• Commitment: having people publicly commit to your brand
• Liking: creating a like-able image and persona for your brand

Influence and persuasion date back to prehistoric days, and the principles mentioned in this book are definitely timeless, the psychology of persuasion has never been more relevant than today, in our social media era.

What’s in it for Social Media Managers: a methodology and a framework to encourage, persuade, and influence your audience responsibly and build your brand on the long haul.

Loomly is a visual social media calendar that lets you preview your posts before you hit publish: start your 15-day free trial now.

Your brand is your personality, the link that connects your company to your customers.

If you want to build a great brand for your company, then look no further than Denise Lee Yohn’s seven brand-building principles in What Great Brands Do: The Seven Brand-Building Principle That Separate The Best From The Rest.

Credit: Amazon.com

What Great Brands Do explains the seven primary principles and best practices to put your company’s brand in the driver’s seat.

To build a great brand:

1. Start inside
2. Avoid selling products
3. Ignore trends
4. Don’t chase customers
5. Sweat the small stuff
6. Commit and stay committed
7. Never have to “give back”

Nearly two-thirds of companies pay millions in marketing and advertising without aligning their strategies with their brand values.

Denise Lee Yohn’s seven brand-building principles will help you avoid these mistakes by adopting a brand-as-business approach.

What Great Brands Do is available on Amazon and you can access a free chapter here.

What’s in it for Social Media Managers: ideas to change the way you think and work on your company’s online social media presence, starting with the basics of what makes a successful brand.

Loomly is a social media planning solution that helps you optimize your presence on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Google+ & LinkedIn: start your 15-day free trial now.

If your brand sells anything online, and you want to boost your sales efficiently and sustainably, then look no further than the eCommerce growth tactics introduced in Let The Ca$h Flow.

The folks from Viral Loops & Contact Pigeon teamed up to create this very nice 39-page free eBook, focusing on the 3 corner stones of eCommerce growth (or any business for that matter):

• Acquisition: how to generate traffic to your store.

• Conversion: how to convert traffic into sales.

• Retention: how to trigger repeat business from existing customers.

The eCommerce growth tactics presented in Let The Ca$h Flow are based on implementation and optimization of content marketing campaigns, signup forms, marketing automation processes, CRO efforts & referral programs: all good stuff!

Recommendations in this eBook are backed by data and illustrated with examples, respectively for more reliability & accuracy.

Download Let The Ca$h Flow for free here.

What’s in it for Social Media Managers: an efficient way to integrate social media efforts into a broader business strategy, for maximum impact on growth.

Loomly is a social media planning solution that helps you optimize your presence on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Google+ & LinkedIn: start your 15-day free trial now.

Previously, we featured Instaread on Loomly Toolkit as a way to read any book in minutes: today, we would like to share another reading-enabling service that sends your whole team email book summaries every week, BooksAtWork.co.

Just because your team is 100% focused on work, does not mean you guys cannot rip the rewards of reading non-fiction books: 15-minute (or less) summaries sent to everyone in your company over email help collaborators develop themselves, become more creative and get new opportunities to bond over their shared readings.

You can read a sample summary of The ONE Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth Behind Extraordinary Results here.

BooksAtWork.co is a service available as a subscription, starting at $19 per month.

Loomly is a social media calendar that helps your team create better content for your audience: start your 15-free trial here.

How do you make a hit — i.e. a product that people like — and what separates commercial failures from successful, similar products?

These are the two main questions answered by senior editor at The Atlantic magazine Derek Thompson, in his recent book Hit Makers: The Science of Popularity in an Age of Distraction:

This is a book about hits, the few products and ideas that achieve extraordinary popularity and commercial success in pop culture and media.

In Hit Makers, you will learn about:

• Why people like what they like (hint: it has to do with basic human needs).

• The role of social media in spreading ideas.

• The economics of cultural markets and the common patterns between hits overtime and over the globe.

Most notably, the author shares stories and insights from success stories of all kinds, from Pokémon Go to the Mona Lisa, Fifty Shades of Grey & Taylor Swift.

Truly fascinating.

What’s in it for Social Media Managers: while you may not be in charge of creating actual products (in the sense of engineering new items for your brand’s catalog), understanding what resonates with (your) audiences is probably the most powerful tool at your disposal to engage with them.

Loomly is a social media calendar solution that helps you create better content for your audience: start your 15-day free trial now.

We already shared all sorts of tools & tips that help create better social media graphics.

Today, we are adding an eBook to this list: Social Media Images: The Ultimate Guide To Designing Epic Graphics by Venngage.

This eBook won’t teach you how to become a proficient designer, but rather:

• Where to look for inspiration.

• Why you need to experiment with existing visual styles.

• How to come up with your own style & illustrate your brand voice.

What’s in it for Social Media Managers: ideas for your next social identity as well as impactful ways to convey your messages on your favorite platforms.

Loomly is a visual social media calendar that lets you preview your posts before you hit publish: start your 15-day free trial now.

Whether you work as a freelancer, with an agency or in the marketing department of a company, understanding how CMOs think can provide tremendous value on a daily basis.

This is where Josh Steimle comes into play, with his book Chief Marketing Officers At Work, a collection of 29 interviews with active CMOs, from Paypal, General Electric, Spotify, Nestlé, Ogilvy & Mather, Harvard Business School, Zendesk, Domo and many more.

Questions answered in this book include:

• What do you look for in hires?

• What kind of metrics do you focus on?

• What are your thoughts on marketing to millennials?

Spoiler:

If there was anything unexpected that resulted from these interviews, it was how tech-savvy these executives were. These individuals are hardly the types to engage in “Mad Men”-style marketing. They are driven by data, yet also aware of the risks posed by depending too much on that data. They are always learning and progressing. Now you have the opportunity to learn from them.

Chief Marketing Officers At Work is available on Amazon.

Loomly is a visual social media planner: start your 15-day free trial now.

As far as customer service is concerned, 84% of US consumers get in touch with brands through social media, chat or email.

Whether you have held a customer service position for a brand, or had to deal with customer service as a consumer, you know how critical it is.

Whether you manage social media for a brand or a business, and regardless of what you “sell”, it is of prime importance to understand the science of shopping.

How and why we, as consumers, make our decisions to purchase or not your product, service or experience.

In his best-selling book Why We Buy: The Science of Shopping, Paco Underhill unveils the four fundamental aspects of shopping as we know it:

• Mechanics

• Demographics

• Dynamics

• Culture

Illustrated with real-life examples, from Amazon and iTunes to innovative malls in emerging markets, this book is a true eye-opener if social media and digital marketing are part of your job description.

Why We Buy: The Science Of Shopping is available here on Amazon.

Happy reading 😉

Loomly is a visual social media planner: start your 15-day free trial now.

AppSamurai is a smart, insight-based solution that helps boost mobile apps in app stores.