I requested this book, because, as someone who works in marketing, and social media/TVC marketing at that, I was really interested in the science behind consumer decisions. I will say that I did not realize quite how close to an academic paper this book was, at least in terms of formatting. I have more experience with narrative nonfiction than with straight nonfiction, but despite this, I found the book to be extremely concise and compelling.

As someone whose colleagues are often less excited than I am about the psychology behind decisions, and the way that those human truths drive larger trends and inform brand strategy, I was excited to see the information made applicable with the inclusion of real-life examples, especially those that lined up with real examples I've used in the past (e.g., Patagonia).

Again, given my reason for requesting (and thus my experience with marketing) I found the third section about e-commerce to be where the book became the most interesting and useful. I am newer to the advertising industry, and on the younger side, so even just getting to hear about the early days of e-commerce and the internet from this perspective was super interesting to me!

If you work in advertising, find psychology interesting, design in-store advertisements like POP, or act as a consumer of goods or services (that is to say everyone), you should give this book a chance. Albeit a little dense, the book is full of really interesting interviews and analyses of brands who are doing it well, and anecdotes that color the information well. I enjoyed it. Thank you to Netgalley for letting me read it in exchange for an honest review.