Amazon.co.uk Review
Gerry McGovern got rich by giving information away and so he understands the Internet better than most of his peers. His Dublin-based company, Nua (which means "new" in Irish) has become one of the world's most successful Internet consultancies, mainly on the back of its free Internet Surveys which are essentially digests of market research on the Internet economy.
But inside Gerry the successful businessman with a list of blue-chip clients, there is another Gerry--the Digital Philosopher--struggling to get out. Every Sunday night, subscribers to his weekly New Thinking Web newsletter find an e-sermon waiting in their mail-boxes on subjects as diverse as the importance of listening to young people, the managerial ability of Alex Ferguson or the future of the family in the digital age. The Caring Economy is a book-length exposition of McGovern's digital philosophy and its application to business. Its title comes from his conviction that the two go together. "A society that stops caring is in for trouble in the long-term", he writes, but companies which don't care about their customers are also doomed. The world is changing. Companies that are not on the Internet in 2005 will not be companies at all. And if they want to be on the Net, they will have to learn to deal with new types of consumer who are smart, sharp and resent being patronised. Business on the Net is about winning the trust of such people. And the only way to do that is to show that you care about them. Who said God and Mammon don't mix? --John Naughton
Synopsis
A cutting-edge appraisal of business practice in the forthcoming Digital Age, this book demonstrates clearly how effective communication and customer interaction will be even more important in the new millennium.
