This terrific new book from two of the world's best-known and respected marketers - Stan Rapp and Chuck Martin - contains a powerful surprise for the reader. The title suggests that it might be about the authors' special take on e-marketing -- it turns out to be that, and much more.

The authors actually tackle a full range of enterprise issues from integrating IT and marketing functions to strategic partnerships to email marketing. Their points are substantiated with dozens of examples and numerous case studies. The effect is a convincing and eye-opening presentation of the extent to which marketing does, and should, pervade every aspect of business today.

The thread that that pulls the authors' observations together is the customer-centric philosophy pioneered by co-author Stan Rapp in his and Tom Collin's book, "MaxiMarketing," published in 1986. The result is a well-organized unfolding of ideas and solutions that help the reader understand how new technologies, such as the wireless Internet, might be used to build customer relationships while simultaneously improving a firm's operating efficiency.

Obviously, the authors are high-level thinkers. Many of their ideas stimulated new ideas for my own business, which is the whole point of a book like this. For example, their discussion of how to turn products into "offerings" by surrounding them with value-added services was especially interesting and helpful.

Perhaps the greatest value of the book is that its seven "imperatives" provide the basis for a sound strategic direction. Follow them and there's little doubt the book will live up to its promise of "dominating" the competition. That's especially helpful these days when change is so rapid and so much is new and untested.

Read this book and be prepared for some very powerful ideas and new directions not just for marketing, but for the entire business.

Commit the Seven Imperatives to memory, but not as a mere mantra. This an essential tool bag ready to go to work. 'Max-e-Marketing in the Net Future: The Seven Imperatives for Outsmarting the Competition in the Net Economy' are seven elegantly crafted and clarifying doses of excellent advice that will de-fuzz the out-of-focus business models of many dot.coms, and for that matter, help any company struggling to straddle and merge the old ways of doing business with e-business. Concise examples from over 200 companies from American Express to zoho.com are cited and explained. Real-world case studies and real-world top executives exclusively interviewed, coupled with Martin and Rapp's own considerable depth and breadth of experience, make this juicy reading. Their perspective is bulls-eye. Once begun, I didn't put it down. Using Martin and Rapp's premises for avoiding pitfalls and grasping opportunities, our dot-com has redefined and refined our own business model so completely that we now have a clear path to profitability. We even take the author's message to the Fortune companies we now call on. 'Max-e-marketing In The Net Future' is all about really getting really real.

Max-E Marketing is a book that I read in an evening, put to work in a day, and will be absorbing for some time to come while evaluating and implementing the seven imperatives in my own business environment. I found the pairing of co-authors Stan Rapp and Chuck Martin to be a master stroke. The combined power of their marketing savvy, e-business vision, and journalistic discipline yields a clarity of thought and usefulness of principle that should help any business executive who is determined to outsmart the competition in the Net Economy. But what really sets this book apart is the rich mix of real-world examples. They represent a range of companies and industries so broad that every reader will find a way to relate to every major point. The seven imperatives each reflect straightforward click-and-mortar business strategy, yet they are presented here as marketing strategy. Lest a reader miss the point of that, the authors deliver the message one more time in imperative number seven: "Make business responsible for marketing and marketing responsible for business."

Exceptional book describing the background of the Natural Step process but more importantly provides evidence that companies who embrace sustainabilty in every aspect will be well rewarded for their efforts. Well done with loads of detail.

The authors provide a real service with this book. So far much of the published work on The Natural Step framework has remained conceptual, without a lot of practical examples of the model in practice. The case examples of IKEA, Collins Pine, and Interface provide valuable references for organizational managers and consultants who are working to build more sustainable organizations. I highly recommend this book.

This is a terrifc book in that it not only lucidly explains the framework of the Natural Step but also gives some excellent practical examples of major corporations starting down the path towards sustainability. This will give them a great competitive edge. With examples like the Natural Step model being applied by the likes of IKEA and Interface one can remain optimistic in the face of the torrent of negatives about the degenerating nature of the world environment. I hope that this book will encourgae others to look nto what the Natural Step has to offer..

Having read many books on database marketing, direct marketing, data mining & CRM as a consultant, I appreciate the story line approach heading up each chapter most. Many books fall prone to teaching "at you" rather than guiding the user along "through the experience of doing it".

A second critical factor to look for - once you've gotten through all the introductory books - is finding concrete info on how-to, best practices providing significant content and knowledge. This is the true value-add from the masters: learning is incremental and there must be true takeaways to get the 5 stars.

This said, the authors have made an extremely broad, detailed and well spun story out of a subject matter that can be to say the least, challenging... Moreover, the disciplines of customer analysis, database management & modeling, data mining, statistical analysis, marketing planning are all the focus of reengineering by many of today's major businesses.

Consequently, this book leads nicely and rather naturally into a major subject of the day for many IT & marketeers -- Analytical CRM. As such it is a must read for anyone interested in understanding how A-CRM works in many companies practicing DBM today.

A great next step would be to go from the marketing-IT function(-ing) to the broader enterprise, long-term (relational) infrastructure & practices preached by CRM. Show how the DBM process evolves in to and is transformed by meeting Customer Mgmt strategies. How would DBM work in a enterprise integration, near/real-time, customer interaction CRM initiative?

Finally, as an aside, in reviewing MANY course syllabi across the world in DM/DBM, I've OFTEN found this book as the course text if not mandatory-suggested reading.

I agree -- for all & anyone wanting a good complement to Shepard's seminal work - you can't do any better.

Buy it ! Good reading...

When I first became involved with database marketing in the mid-1990s, and through my tour of graduate school a few years later, books on the subject fell into two categories: basic and trivial, or advanced and impossible to comprehend. OPTIMAL DATABASE MARKETING is the perfect reference for what is probably the majority audience segment: marketing managers, senior executives, list professionals, data processors, professors, and students who want to understand all the elements of strategic planning and analysis *and* gain practical knowledge to apply professionally or in research endeavors.

In OPTIMAL DATABASE MARKETING, you get a wealth of material on two aspects of the process - for the price of one. Co-author Ron Drozdenko does a great job defining concepts and detailing potential objectives when building files. His coverage of technical specifications and issues is particularly useful.

As for the subsequent chapters: I don't think there has ever been a book written which covers database modeling, and statistical techniques germane to direct marketing, as comprehensively and clearly. Co-author Perry Drake manages to leave no stone unturned and yet convey knowledge in a style that's both understandable and easy to follow. This part of the book is worth the cost alone.

This book is an excellent tool for direct marketers who need to develop, manage and optimize a database. Tells what to do... what to avoid... I recommend it highly.

The Wild West days of the dot-com craze are behind us, but e-business strategy remains a largely uncharted frontier. In fact, e-commerce seems more bewildering than ever, now that many of the strategic maxims that the Internet bubble was built on have been proved false. To help you get a handle on the revolutionary technology that has survived the collapse, Nirmal Pal and Judith M. Ray have collected articles by researchers and executives, including many from their home base, the e-Business Research Center at Pennsylvania State University. This anthology constitutes a solid and well-researched book, which has sufficient gravitas (and jargon) for an academic and enough practical information for an entrepreneur. The multiple authors sometimes overlap as they dissect various e-business approaches, but all offer worthwhile ideas. We [...] recommend this book to executives at any company, since Internet technology is now ubiquitous, and distinctions between old economy and New Economy are fast falling by the wayside.

The various authors examine "key themes" that intersect all manner of changes now occurring during what they characterize as an "information revolution": free agency, compressed supply chains, co-opetition, obliteration of boundaries, e-leadership, the elimination of hierarchies, emergence of electronic marketplaces ("bazaars"), club membership, and finally, "trust brokers" who serve as "an incentive and penalty mechanism to uphold the 'digital order' in global, real-time electronic markets." The material is presented and then developed by within 14 chapters. In Chapter 1, for example, Ghadar and Leonard "deliberate on how the digital economy is forcing a fundamental and permanent shift in the way enterprise strategies are developed, and in the process raise significant new challenges for managers. In Chapter 7, Bhargava and Lee "provide valuable insights about emerging technologies and practices that will help organizations remain open and flexible in response to the changing technological environment so that past information technology investments remain useful and valuable in the future." And in the final chapter, Loomis and Gerhard "identify several strategic issues facing executives who must lead or interact within the e-government environment." All manner of forces are driving the expansion and consequent complexity of the "digital frontier" and at an ever-increasing velocity. Here in a single source are a range and diversity of perspectives on this process. The editors are to be commended on the selection and presentation of the 14 separate but inter-related essays. I also appreciate the "About the Contributors" section which identifies dozens of supplementary sources to consult for those to wish to explore specific issues in much greater depth. Those who share my regard for this book are urged to check out Profit from the Core, written by Chris Zook with James Allen, which suggests a number of growth strategies which are also worthy of careful consideration.

This is a wonderful collection of leading edge research and practical advice from experts in the field of e-business, e-commerce, and e-"anything". The authors and editors have created a very timely set of e-business thinking, imperatives, and recommendations, as well as practical and real life examples to cement the concepts. I highly recommend this book!

The internet offers incredible opportunities, provided businesses and their advisors do not lose sight of the traditional, fundamental concepts of commerce and economics.

The old rules still apply is the message of author Stan Liebowitz, economist and professor of managerial economics at the University of Texas at Dallas. The Internet creates value by lowering the costs of information transmission. Internet boosters went wrong when they sought to re-write the foundational laws of economics practiced by their bricks-and-mortar competitors. The impact of economies of scale depends on the industry, not on whether the company is internet-based or not.

The author also debunks three other "new" economy myths:
•The first mover advantage. Many internet companies mistakenly rushed to market with inferior products and services - and paid the ultimate price.
•Not everything can be sold on the Internet.
•Customer service still counts.

Liebowitz argues network effects, economies of scale; instant scalability and winner-take-all strategies provide advantages and disadvantages to the consumer. To know which products are likely to succeed on the Internet, the business person must consider:
•Size and bulk of the product relative to its value.
•Immediate gratification factor.
•Perishable items are not meant to be shipped over long distances.
•Some products need to be experienced.

This well-written, often witty book is the first I have come across that seeks to salvage lesions from what is commonly thought of as the "Internet Bubble." The impact of the Internet on our society is not to be trivialized. Information is now available in abundance. Discovering the lessons the media's boosters ignored, Liebowitz argues, if one seeks to learn what the media's "boosters" ignored to their peril, will benefit the reader.

"Re-thinking the Network Economy" is an almost deceptively simple book, and that is all to the good for readers. Stan Liebowitz is a highly skilled economist with the ability to make his professional work accessible to interested laymen. Even more interesting to me, as a small businessman, is his intuitive grasp of the entrepreneurial process. His work just has a natural fit to the business world I know, and that is rare among academics, in my experience.

Though some of his humor can make a businessman wince at times, say his: "And of course, once computers are taught to bend the truth, they can replace salesmen of all sorts".

I once observed a young American woman, on a sunny July day in 1974, practicing her college Italian in one those street bazaars in Florence. I think it must have been written in some Intelligent Woman's Guide to Tourism in Cute Mediterranean Countries, that haggling was expected. When the woman responded to a merchant's price quote with a lower offer, he said in perfect English: "Look lady, it's hot, I'm hungry. If you insist on haggling, come back after lunch, but you're going to pay the price I just gave you anyhow."

She bought the dress, but you can find the reason for the merchant's attitude in chapter 4 of this book.

Also, I'm old enough to have been attended to, as a child, by a doctor who made house calls. The reasons why doctors no longer do so are to be found in Liebowitz's explanations of the efficiencies of supermarket shopping: Customers prefer to substitute their uncompensated time for the paid time that delivered groceries would necessarily entail.

So, why did so many smart people lose billions of dollars trying to make viable businesses out of delivering ice cream, chicken, and orange juice? Liebowitz hazards a few guesses, not all of which are going to sit well with some of his colleagues who gave advice that may have inadvertently encouraged such nonsense. Those of us with first-hand experience of how expensive it is to operate trucks and pay their drivers, who were scratching our heads watching refrigerated trucks drive through our neighborhoods, wondering how this could possibly be a cost effective way for consumers to shop, can have a lot of fun reading about it though.

The penultimate chapter, "Copyright and the Internet" has some, perhaps, counterintuitive arguments to make about digital reproduction and transmission of copyright materials. Including a novel explanation (to me) of how charging libraries for photocopying articles from scholarly journals actually increased the importance of those journals to scholars. This seems to me a major lesson to be learned in the current contentious copyright debates.

In short, Re-Thinking the Network Economy, packs a lot of useful information into its 224 pages. It's erudite, witty, and might have saved the New Economy, and its investors, tens (and maybe hundreds) of billions of dollars had it been published even five years earlier.

Back Cover Blurbs:
Absolutely the best book I've read on e-commerce. Liebowitz looks at all the claims made for how "the Internet changes everything" and shows, persuasively, that it changes only a few things. If you want to know how to integrate the Internet into your business or how to judge the future success of Internet-based firms, or if you just want a master economist's understanding of the Internet's impact on the economy, Re-Thinking the Network Economy is the book for you. --David R. Henderson, author of The Joy of Freedom: An Economist's Odyssey, former columnist, Red Herring.

Stan Liebowitz's book brings a breath of fresh air to popular Internet debates. This lively and informative discussion exposes many of the Internet-related myths about network externalities, technology lock-in, and first-mover advantage. Managers would do well to understand his point that tried-and-true business strategies continue to apply-Daniel F. Spulber, Elinor Hobbs Distinguished Professor, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University.

"Prof. Liebowitz's analysis is sharp, reflecting an impressive combination of economic theory, history, and just the right amount of geekiness. Whether you are a businessperson plotting your next move or an individual simply curious about why the dot com bust happened, buy this book. The Internet will still be important. Professor Liebowitz tells us why." Sonia Arrison, Director, Center for Technology Studies, Pacific Research Institute

In Rethinking the Networked Economy, Stan Liebowitz dissects the faulty business case that helped fuel the Internet hysteria. The autopsy yields important insights. Liebowitz explains why some businesses suit the Internet economy and some don't, why some industries are winner-take-all contests but most aren't, and why a few industries offer first-mover advantages but most don't. The result is handbook for e-commerce that is grounded in simple but powerful economic reasoning that is fully explained within, and supported by an abundance of real world evidence.-Stephen E. Margolis, Chairman, NC State U Economics.

A very well organized and useful reference text regarding encryption na dcertificates. I was pleased at the singling out of PG and its differences versus other X509 standards.

Highly recommended - This is still the best intro book I've seen on PKI. Precisely and clearly written. Can't wait for the second edition, though, as this edition is getting a bit dated.

This book is great at understanding the major components of a Public Key Infrastructure and the surrounding issues. You certainly would not walk away being able to set up a PKI, but you would be able to discuss it intelligently. If you are trying to come up to speed on PKI, this is the book for you. The subject is too big to cover everything in one book; so, I would also recommend picking up some more books that look at security issues specifically. One recommendation is E-Commerce Security by Ghosh.

This is a delightful book: it is smart but easy to read. The author burns images and analogies into your mind that are unforgetable. In particular, I cannot forget his treatment of time and privacy. These are the best descriptions of the problems of privacy in the internet and in the compression of time that I have ever read. Overall, this book makes you think but flows easily and conversationally. He is dealing with big issues in an accessible way.

What a great book. This is fun book that also makes your think. Mr. Moore has an easy, conversational style that is both engaging yet provocative. I will never think about time, truth, trust and privacy in the same way again....I learned a lot

Mr. Moore provides a superb framework for understanding how to create competitive advantage in a time of unrelenting pressure on our time. As an E-commerce manager, I found myself challenging my current priorities against "the verities of time, truth, trust, and privacy." This book is incredibly thought provoking.

The author seems to have "bought" into Public Key Infrastructure completely. Many chapters have a simliar formula:

1. Explain background on the compliance issue or standard

2. Then explain why PKI is so great and solves a majority of the problems with the particular issue being discussed.

This leaves a bit to be desired in some cases as the compliance-heavy discussions really move past PKI and into extremely detailed market compliance issues. This book will be useful for individuals looking for information having to do with Financial, e-Government, and Health Care compliance issues but not necessarily with PKI implementations for Enterprise organizations.

Good stuff on PKI: technical and business angles. Compliance was the main reason I took at look at this book, since HIPAA affects us day to day. I did appreciate the introduction to the technology (with technical depth). One thing I did really like it was that (to large degree) the book was vendor neutral. Some of the books through the RSA label have some spin. Definitely worth adding this book to the security collection.

This book covers a good chunk of digital security strategies with a focus on digital certificates (PKI). The first part of the book covers the PKI basics including technical and business topics. The next part of the book goes over the compliance laws (in relevant vertical areas) and how PKI (and compatible technologies) help resolve them. The last part of the book goes over resources and specific products/companies.

What I really liked about this book is it focus on how solve real problems such as compliance issues. Plus the case studies and specific vendor references make this is a good book to use for actual implementations.

Finally, this is a recent book on PKI and I have not seen too much on this topic as of late. The international coverage in the book also does well to keep the material relevant and current.

I would say this book would be ideal for security consultants as well as decision makers doing anything related to digital certificates and/or ecommerce in general.

The fact that everyone uses the web in some way or another, this is a good book to have. I am a computer junkie and this book definitely kept my head afloat. But I highly recommend you read "A Branded World" by Michael Levine. This author really knows what he's talking about. The next time a company hands out memos to its employees, make sure "A Branded World" is on the top of the page!

I haven't made it past chapter 3 and I have already read a wealth of helpful information on branding your business name and branding tools. The author provides a detailed, step-by-step guide to branding and marketing techniques one can use both online and offline. This book is a must read for first-time start-ups and entreprenuers.

This is a great book for those of you who want to make a name for yourself on-line. Bob has an abundance of ideas to get you started and to keep you going as you explore the ways to market yourself online. Bob has a very witty and humorous way to keep you interested in what he has to say. I think Mr. Baker is on the cutting edge of where the future of online marketing is headed. I highly recommend this book.

If you are like me and you are frustrated after picking up an IT book and only getting superficial platitudes rather than keen insights, then you may be pleasantly surprised by this book because it really reveals, as the title states, the "Power of Events." The book starts off establishing the author's grounding in Enterprise Architectures (and their shortcomings), and then proceeds to build an intuitive foundation to seduce the reader into the world of events that they may not have realized was so much a part of distributed systems. While the formal notation used in the book may appear daunting, it is easily mastered and the subtle rules and mechanism are exposed through many thoughtful examples. I will say the second half of the book is a slower read than the 1st part, but the book should leave you with some confidence that there really are some breakthroughs in software technology that will have a positive impact on distributed IT System quality and the complex event processing shows that potential.

As IT infrastructure weaves itself into every aspect of a business, managing these systems becomes an imperative. The Lines of Business demand complete and the real time visibility into the IT infrastructure. Most systems developed do not allow the IT departments to manage at these levels. Dr Luckhams book propose a framework for managing this complexity. He puts forth, in a simple and readable manner how do manage systems by observing the "Cloud of Events" and how to build systems that are easier to manage.

It is the first book that I have come across that deals with the topic of IT management at a level that is not too abstract or complete focused on existing tools, instead Dr Luckham takes the reader much closer to a solution to the problem by getting them to think about the problem in the right way. He puts years of Stanford research into a readable form for the ordinary mortal. Bravo.

It is seldom that one comes across a software engineering book that is free of hype and doesn't cut corners when it comes to providing details. This book is a must-have for every software professional. You don't have to be working on a cutting edge project to benefit from this book. What this book teaches is a new way of critically thinking about complex software design and architecture. The book is masterfully written and as its Preface states, is the result of over a decade of hard-core research into event pattern matching conducted at Stanford University. This is a book that one can put to use right away, using tools and systems that are available today.