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Clicks, hits and old-school acumen
REVIEWS BY LINDA M. CASTELLITTO Even as individuals strive to field economic, political and social curveballs that affect how we save, spend and invest our money, businesses are on the lookout for the next great way to market and sell their products. Whether analyzing spreadsheets or exploring the possibilities of Web 2.0, learning what makes consumers tick is always on the corporate radar. These books look at what businesses are up to today—and what they're planning to do tomorrow.
Time magazine called billionaire T. Boone Pickens a real-life J.R. Ewing. Both are Texas oil barons, and they're quite wealthy, thanks to plenty of business savvy and an energetic affinity for taking risks. But it's unlikely the fictional J.R. would've written a book like The First Billion is the Hardest: Reflections on a Life of Comebacks and America's Energy Future. In this memoir-cum-business-book, Pickens is just as up-front about his battle with depression as he is about his various corporate takeovers in an interesting mix of personal revelations and professional excitement. Every chapter includes "Booneisms" like "Don't rush the monkey and you'll see a better show" and "In a deal between friends, there's no place for a wolverine." Pickens also debunks myths about the oil industry and details his impact on corporate practices: "Through our takeover attempts, my team and I introduced the concept that reigns supreme today—shareholder value." After 40 years at the helm of Mesa Petroleum, he started up BP Capital, a commodities and equities firm, during his seventh decade. Today, at 80, he's one of the world's highest-paid hedge fund managers. Pickens' no-nonsense, you-can-do-it-too approach works, whether he's extolling the benefits of physical fitness, offering an energy plan for America or reminding readers that "Action leads to more action. One deal leads to another deal."
By T. Boone Pickens Crown Business, $26.95 272 pages, ISBN 9780307395771
Any time we log on to a website, make a cell phone call or swipe a credit card, we leave a virtual trail behind. That much is clear (or should be) to any technology user. Nonetheless, The Numerati by BusinessWeek writer Stephen Baker will be an eye-opening read for even the techiest among us. The Numerati, he explains, are the computer scientists and mathematicians who analyze our every click in an effort to learn how humans shop, work and consume media. He writes, "In a single month, Yahoo alone gathers 110 billion pieces of data about its customers," but notes that sorting through data and assembling useable patterns is a mighty task—there's still plenty of untapped potential. At Carnegie Mellon, grad students analyze old Enron emails for hints about the company's downfall. IBM uses staffers' contact lists to track employee engagement and productivity. An unnamed grocery chain assesses purchasing patterns; someday, that data could be used in "smart carts," with screens that display targeted information or special offers. Fascinating? Yes. Creepy? Sure. But Baker also points out that there's a non-commercial aspect to the Numeratis' work: applications for medicine, security, even love (via better matches for online daters). After all, the Numerati are people, too.
By Stephen Baker Houghton Mifflin, $26 288 pages, ISBN 9780618784608
By Bill Tancer Hyperion, $25.95 240 pages, ISBN 9781401323042
Linda M. Castellitto's data trail originates in North Carolina.
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Texas tea and wisdom
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Data is the new black
Bill Tancer loves data, and he's not ashamed to say so. The Time.com columnist and manager of global research at Hitwise, a competitive intelligence company, is passionate about his work: he monitors and analyzes online behavior in search of clues, trends and patterns that can help companies understand their customers. Click: What Millions of People are Doing Online and Why it Matters has real-life examples aplenty drawn from Tancer's work at Hitwise, plus anecdotes that detail his experiences as a speaker and/or attendee at various conferences and trade shows, where he encounters all manner of data aficionados. He offers interesting, odd statistics (more than 20 percent of all inbox spam is related to Viagra; online searches for "prom dress" peak in January, contrary to the April or May surge one would expect) and shares the details of his quests to understand these phenomena. Tancer believes "we can learn more about ourselves through our Internet behavior," and his enthusiasm for data-modeling is infectious. (Really.) Here's a bit of data-modeling: readers who liked Malcolm Gladwell's The Tipping Point will enjoy this book, too.