Q&A with my great friend and mentor, Stan Rapp, about his latest book, Release the Power of Entangled Marketing

  
(Stan Rapp over video announcing the acquisition of my first company to the staff)

Stan Rapp is one of my favorite people, for so many reasons. First, and how I initially came to meet him, is because he bought my first company (along with my friends at Halyard Capital) in 2008! It was Stan that pushed my partners and me over the edge to choose Engauge over another competitive bid. More on that journey here.

After the sale, I had the chance to work closely with Stan for over five years. I learned so much from Stan about entrepreneurship, leadership, and marketing, that I feel like I was able to get a mini-MBA from his mentorship. But it was his friendship and belief in me that meant the world, and I’ll forever be indebted to him for that.

One of the many things that I admire about Stan is that he’s a wonderful writer and author of several books. He’s that rare combination of visionary plus practitioner. So when he told me he had just released his latest book, Release the Power of Entangled Marketing, I quickly read it and asked if he’d let me interview him on my blog. He agreed, and here we go!

5 questions for Stan Rapp about his new book, Release the Power of Entangled Marketing

I thoroughly enjoyed reading Release the Power of Entangled Marketing, your latest book co-authored with Sebastian Jespersen. The concept of “entanglement” is a perfect vision of where marketing should evolve for a brand. How did you first conceive it?

The inspiration came from an article I ran across in Scientific American magazine. It was about the fundamental principle of quantum mechanics. In the subatomic world a pair of particles never let go of one another. Metaphorically it’s the kind of inseparable relationship any company would love to have with customers. What followed was the realization that entangling the brand and the consumer in a supportive relationship is the new fundamental of business success.

Sebastian Jespersen, CEO of the Vertic digital agency, seems the perfect choice as a co-author. How did your relationship come to be?

A business friend at AARP told me about breakthroughs being made by Vertic’s stellar list of clients. He said that the two of us should get to know one another, you think so alike. Sebastian and I shared ideas over an introductory lunch. From the start, the chemistry was terrific despite differences in age, nationality and experience.

As you worked on the book together, did you find that brands today were further behind, or ahead, in their mastery of entangled marketing?

We found that there were quite a few experiments with parts of the new model, but very few companies fully embraced the new thinking. The surprise was our discovery that entangling the brand and the consumer is what the Internet titans — Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, Facebook, Google — have in common. What works for those behemoths can be scaled down to work for any size company.

You’ve written several books now, what advice do you have for first-time authors out there?

Wish you were born 20 years earlier. The digital disruption of the publishing industry makes it difficult for a first time author to get through the noise and clutter. Write about what you believe is a transformational concept. Get a relevant conversation going about your new approach in social media. Hold down your expectations. Your first book is a launching pad for what follows in your lifetime career.

What’s next for Stan Rapp? :)

There’s nothing like writing a book about an original concept to discover its full potential. What’s next for me is making others aware of how entangling the brand and the consumer empowers both sides of the relationship. Some of the tools are in place to make it happen. There are QR codes in the book linking its content to updates posted at our entangledmarketing.com website. There is an Entangled Marketing Group on LinkedIn where business executives will be sharing their bold initiatives with us. There are press interviews and speaking appearances to spread the word online and offline.

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