Enchantment: Creating Buy-In the magnanimous way

Technorati tags: Book Review, Enchantment, Guy Kawasaki

Enchantment 
Author: Guy Kawasaki
Publisher: Portfolio – Penguin (US)
ISBN: 9781591843795
Hardcover, 224 pages

It’s been quite a while since Walski last did a book review. And this review comes to you somewhat by happen-chance. Here’s how it came to be:

Walski has been somewhat of a Guy Kawasaki fan, ever since he read “Selling The Dream” many years ago. That, of course, wasn’t Guy’s first book. Although the former Apple evangelist had written two other books prior, Walski must admit that although he’d heard of the name Guy Kawasaki before, he didn’t really know who the person was.

All that changed when Walski read Selling the Dream.

Over the years, he’s read several of Guy’s other books (Enchantment is his 10th). More recently, Walski has also been following Guy on Twitter (@GuyKawasaki), and so when he received an e-mail enquiring whether or not Walski would be interested in reviewing Guy’s upcoming book, he almost automatically responded Yes. At the back of his mind, though, Walski didn’t think that he’d actually get a preview copy for review, being that pre-sales preview copies are usually limited to the US (from experience).

Well surprise, surprise… the book was delivered a couple of weeks ago, and the bargain was struck – Walski was to read the book, and do a review before the official store release of Enchantment, which in the US is March 8, 2011 (tomorrow).

But enough about how this review came to be... the more important question: what is Enchantment all about? 
(Enchantment, how to achieve it, and more, in the full post)

If Walski were asked to provide a one-sentence description, you would have already read it much earlier in this post. Didn’t catch it? Scroll up, and look at the post title. In a nutshell, that’s what Enchantment is about – a book detailing the kinder, gentler way of creating buy-in.

And it doesn’t really matter what you’re trying to sell or promote – it could literally be anything: a product, a service, a community program, a pet cause… Anything, in other words, that would require buy-in to further its success.

Walski’s not sure in what section you would find Enchantment in Malaysian bookstores once it’s available here, but very likely it would be placed in the Business section, under the Marketing category. But the tools you will acquaint yourself with in Enchantment aren’t limited to the business world alone. And that’s one of the key reasons why Walski thinks this book is important one to read.

One of the reasons why Walski likes Guy Kawasaki – as an author – is that his writing style makes reading  his books quite effortless. It’s almost like you open the book, and Guy’s right there talking you through the pages. This personal touch also helps the reader absorb the material more easily.

As with his previous books, what Guy relates to us is, in most cases, not something we don’t already know – which brings us to another reason why Walski likes this book (and his previous others): Enchantment essentially acts as a mental-recall gel, helping you organize what your common sense and inner self probably already know.

Peppered liberally throughout the book are real-life examples and anecdotes relating topically to the components that make up Enchantment. This further helps us understand how the concepts articulated in the book relate to real life situations. And when we are able to relate, we’re more equipped to apply.

In promoting this book, Guy has provided a plethora of online resources. One of the more enchanting ones is a summary of how Enchantment can be achieved.

Yes, it’s an Enchantment cheat sheet. But as we know, cheat sheets are only useful if you’re familiar with the material they represent. In other words, you get most out of it only if you’ve read the book. Specifically, this cheat sheet does two things:

• it saves Walski from writing more than he needs to
• makes you want to learn more (hopefully)

While Enchantment is very possible (and not difficult) to achieve, it may not be appropriate for everyone, or every situation. Guy is honest enough to provide examples of such personalities and situations in his book. As a bonus, he’s even provided an online Enchantment self-assessment you can try out to see how well prepared you already are to begin your journey towards being enchanting.

Walski’s verdict? If you are someone who needs to prepare his/her-self well in order that s/he can more easily and convincingly create buy-in (of some variety), then definitely go buy the book, once it’s available. In the US, the book should be on the shelves tomorrow (March 8, 2011), and probably in a few weeks time elsewhere.

And if you’re not someone who needs to create buy-in at this juncture of space-time, get it anyway. Purchasing a book, particularly a good one like Enchantment, is never a waste. After all, life is but a journey, and you never really know where it will take you, until you get there.

You never know – there may yet be a time when Enchantment is exactly what you’ll need. And a head-start never hurts.