How Capitalism Will Save Us

The future of your company is not in measured, considered responses and carefully planned initiatives. Business today is about near-instantaneous response. About doing the best you can with extremely limited information. About every customer being a reporter, and every reporter being a customer. About winning and losing customers in real-time, every second of every day. About a monumental increase in the findable commentary about our companies.

Having the time and information required to make a considered business decision is a luxury - a luxury that's quickly facing extinction. Yet business hasn't adapted to this evolution. And adapt you must.

This book isn't about how to "do" social media. Instead, The Now Revolution outlines how you must retool your organization to make real-time business work for you rather than against you. Read about seven shifts that will help you make your company faster, smarter, and more social:

• Engineer a New Bedrock
• Find Talent You Can Trust
• Organize your Armies
• Answer the New Telephone
• Emphasize Response-Ability
• Build a Fire Extinguisher
• Make a Calculator

The Now Revolution is pushing you to adapt the way you do business, from the inside out. It impacts your organization culturally, operationally, and functionally. This book is your guide to making the changes you need, and to harnessing the potential of this new communication era.

Engage! thoroughly examines the social media landscape and how to effectively use social media to succeed in business—one network and one tool at a time. It leads you through the detailed and specific steps required for conceptualizing, implementing, managing, and measuring a social media program. The result is the ability to increase visibility, build communities of loyal brand enthusiasts, and increase profits.

Covering everything you need to know about social media marketing and the rise of the new social consumer, Engage! shows you how to create effective strategies based on proven examples and earn buy-in from your marketing teams. Even better, you'll learn how to measure success and ROI.

• Introduces you to the psychology, behavior, and influence of the new social consumer
• Shows how to define and measure the success of your social media campaigns for the short and long term
• Features an inspiring Foreword by actor Ashton Kutcher, who has more than 5 million followers on Twitter
• Revised paperback edition brings the book completely up to date to stay ahead of the lightning fast world of social media

Jake’s body is as cold as ice when Dusty finds him struggling to stay alive.  He takes him to his camp, pulls him close, and soon the young body begins to stir.  The young man turns toward the warmth and snuggles close, opens his eyes to see Dusty’s peaceful face, and feels the touch of naked skin to skin.  In shock, he jumps back, stands, and trips in the tangled blanket.  Dusty is up lightning quick, the sun placing his nude body in perfect silhouette.  He soon learns that the young cowboy he saved from a sure death is in more trouble than even he knows, daring to cross one of the roughest gangs in the Southwest.  Dusty knows the gang well.  They take no prisoners.  They took his friend, his lover, his soul mate years ago, and now they are after Jake.  The young cowboy stirs up old feelings, good and bad, from Dusty’s past, a past he has come here to put behind him once and for all.  But can he save Jake from the lawless, or will he lose another cowboy?

Excerpt:
“If it feels right, it’s right.  Don’t you get it?  That’s just the way it is.”

Jake roughly grabs Dusty and pulls him in, body to body.  “Does this feel right?”

Dusty grabs him back face to face.  “It could.” 

Jake breathes in scared and elated all at once.  Dusty kisses him hard, slamming him back into a tree.  The young man seems lost at first, but then forcefully kisses back. 

A twig snaps and Dusty draws his gun as Misty walks into the moonlight, scaring Jake.

“How long have you been there, girl?”

“Long enough to get an eyeful of you two.”

“Come on, Jake.”  Dusty holsters his gun and grabs the young man’s arm.

“Wait, I don’t care.  I’ve seen worse.  You two can come up to my room and nobody will know.”

Jake is mesmerized, not having felt this way before.  “You are the best thing that has happened to me.”

Dusty turns and looks back at Jake’s innocent eyes, and his stern features soften.  “It’s been a long time.” 

******

Chad turns to creep to safety and another bullet comes from the house splashing in the mud by his feet.  Unsure of which way to go, he stops and a strong hand palming a hunting knife comes to his throat stopping him.
 
“I guess you don’t like it when somebody takes you from behind,” Dusty meanly says in Chad’s ear.

“No, wait!  I ain’t done you no harm.”  He turns his head far enough to see Dusty.

“That’s a lie.  You’ve had this coming since what you did to Jimmy at the cabin.”

Chad’s eyes widen in sudden recognition.  “It can’t be you…you burned… years ago.”

Christopher Bram tells the story of Augustus Fitzwilliam Boyd, alias Dr. August, a clairvoyant pianist who communes with ghosts, and who finds meaning in his life through a strange love triangle with a righteous ex-slave and nervous white governess. Spanning the years between the Civil War and the early 1920's, this riveting and ambitious historical novel displays the immense talents of a prodigious, highly esteemed author working at the height of his powers.