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Spin is an extremely enjoyable read. A talented communicator, Clive Veroni writes in a simple and clear style and does not hold his dry wit back from the narrative – making the book much more fun (particularly when it follows Ellul in the reading list.)

Veroni presents numerous real world examples of strategic communications successes – and failures – analyzing each case for strengths and weaknesses.  While drawing from the techniques used in political campaigning, Spin showcases work from a variety of fields, recommending tactics all communicators and organisations should be adopting in a Digital Age.

There is much to gain in the reading of Spin, but in particular the following stands out:

  • Operating on tighter deadlines, or in a sort of “war room” manner enables communicators to react with the speed required in a Digital Age. Most marketers have not caught up;
  • Build agile and diverse teams that have decision-makers built-in; and
  • For better or worse, people are involved in your brand. Finding ways to harness that engagement must go beyond crowd sourcing ads or new logos.

Spin: How Politics Has the Power to Turn Marketing on Its Head is available for purchase at Amazon.

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About Author

La Generalista is the online identity of Alicia Wanless – a researcher and practitioner of strategic communications for social change in a Digital Age. Alicia is the director of the Partnership for Countering Influence Operations at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. With a growing international multi-stakeholder community, the Partnership aims to foster evidence-based policymaking to counter threats within the information environment. Wanless is currently a PhD Researcher at King’s College London exploring how the information environment can be studied in similar ways to the physical environment. She is also a pre-doctoral fellow at Stanford University’s Center for International Security and Cooperation, and was a tech advisor to Aspen Institute’s Commission on Information Disorder. Her work has been featured in Lawfare, The National Interest, Foreign Policy, and CBC.

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