Gamify

Take your business to the next level - for the win. Millions flock to their computers, consoles, mobile phones, tablets, and social networks each day to play World of Warcraft, Farmville, Scrabble, and countless other games, generating billions in sales each year. The careful and skillful construction of these games is built on decades of research into human motivation and psychology: A well-designed game goes right to the motivational heart of the human psyche.

In this groundbreaking audiobook, Amy Jo Kim lays out a step-by-step system for crafting products that people love...and keep loving. The secret? Develop “impossible to put down” products by using techniques that the fast-moving games industry employs when making games that glue millions of players to their screens. 

The new era of gamification and human-focused design optimizes for motivation and engagement over traditional function-focused design. Within the industry, studies on game mechanics and behavioral psychology have become proliferate. However, few people understand how to merge the two fields into experience designs that reliably increases business metrics and generates a return on investment.

This unique guide features the start-up stories of regular people launching side businesses that almost anyone can do: an urban tour guide, an artist inspired by maps, a travel site founder, an ice pop maker, and many more. In 100 Side Hustles, best-selling author of The $100 Startup Chris Guillebeau presents an "idea book" filled with inspiration for your next big idea. Distilled from Guillebeau's popular Side Hustle School podcast, these case studies feature teachers, artists, coders, and even entire families who've found ways to create new sources of income.

Leading innovation expert Alec Ross explains what's next for the world, mapping out the advances and stumbling blocks that will emerge in the next 10 years - for businesses, governments, and the global community - and how we can navigate them.

All our lives are constrained by limited space and time, limits that give rise to a particular set of problems. What should we do, or leave undone, in a day or a lifetime? How much messiness should we accept? What balance of new activities and familiar favorites is the most fulfilling? These may seem like uniquely human quandaries, but they are not: computers, too, face the same constraints, so computer scientists have been grappling with their version of such problems for decades.

Game theory means rigorous strategic thinking. It’s the art of anticipating your opponent’s next moves, knowing full well that your rival is trying to do the same thing to you. Though parts of game theory involve simple common sense, much is counterintuitive, and it can only be mastered by developing a new way of seeing the world. Using a diverse array of rich case studies - from pop culture, TV, movies, sports, politics, and history - the authors show how nearly every business and personal interaction has a game-theory component to it.

In Super Bowl XLIX, Seahawks coach Pete Carroll made one of the most controversial calls in football history: With 26 seconds remaining, and trailing by four at the Patriots' one-yard line, he called for a pass instead of a handing off to his star running back. The pass was intercepted, and the Seahawks lost. Critics called it the dumbest play in history. But was the call really that bad? Or did Carroll actually make a great move that was ruined by bad luck? Even the best decision doesn't yield the best outcome every time.

There is no simple strategic method for dealing with the multidimensional nature of digital change. Even the sharpest leaders can become disoriented as change builds on change, leaving almost nothing certain. Yet to stand still is to fail. Enterprises and leaders must remaster themselves to succeed. Leaders must identify the key macro forces then lead their organizations at three distinct levels: industry, enterprise, and self. By doing this they can not only survive but clean up.

If you've ever used ZipCar, Amazon Prime, Spotify, NetFlix, Groupon, Weight Watchers, SurveyMonkey, United Mileage Plus, Pinterest, or Twitter, you are part of The Membership Economy, an increasingly popular model that author Robbie Kellman Baxter sees as the inevitable result of technological advancements, social trends, and a generation in transition. The Membership Economy argues that we are now moving away from ownership, but we still want the benefits that come with access.

In YouTube Secrets, online video experts Sean Cannell and Benji Travis draw on a decade of experience as well as interviews with more than 100 top creators to give you a step-by-step YouTube success playbook.

Due to its raw storytelling style, compelling content, and fast pace, Explosive Growth is a one-of-a-kind business book that transcends the narrow entrepreneurial audience to also appeal to listeners and business students looking to learn about startup life and entrepreneurship. It holds nothing back while detailing the highest highs and lowest lows of what it's really like to run a startup. 

Donald Miller's StoryBrand process is a proven solution to the struggle business leaders face when talking about their businesses. This revolutionary method for connecting with customers provides listeners with the ultimate competitive advantage, revealing the secret for helping their customers understand the compelling benefits of using their products, ideas, or services.

Why do some products capture our attention, while others flop? What makes us engage with certain products out of habit? Is there a pattern underlying how technologies hook us? This audiobook introduces listeners to the "Hook Model," a four steps process companies use to build customer habits. Through consecutive hook cycles, successful products reach their ultimate goal of bringing users back repeatedly - without depending on costly advertising or aggressive messaging. Hooked is a guide to building products people can't put down.

Silicon Valley is renowned for its striking number of businesses which have grown from garage start-ups into global giants - Apple, Cisco, Google, HP and Intel, to name a few. But what is the secret to their outstanding success? Hoffman and Yeh explain that it’s simple: they’ve learnt how to blitzscale. Featuring case studies from numerous prominent tech businesses such as AirBnB and WeChat, this book offers a specific set of practices for catalysing and managing dizzying growth in burgeoning start-ups.