SPECIAL EVENT - Stories, Myths & Cults (with Douglas Atkin)

A change-of-pace event for us!

Special guest, celebrated author and authority on the practices of cults, Douglas Atkin, will spend an evening with our group, exploring the themes of personal stories and myths.

Douglas is the author of The Culting of Brands: When Customers Become True Believers.

He's also the Chief Community Officer at Meetup.

This special event will be held at the SOHO office of Meetup.com.

Here's Douglas' description of the event:

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ABOUT THE EVENING:

Douglas will present the key findings from his research on belief, belonging and the role of the master and personal narrative.

His research was undertaken over 10 years and uncovered insights from members of all kinds of belonging organizations, from cult brands to religious cults, from the Marines to fan clubs, from sororities to Mary Kay.

He has decoded why people belong to these organizations and how those organizations attract devoted followers.

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ABOUT DOUGLAS ATKIN:

Douglas Atkin is a partner and Chief Community Officer at Meetup.com, and author of the book The Culting of Brands: When Customers Become True Believers.

A native of Great Britain, Atkin's interest in brands began at Procter & Gamble, where he worked in Brand Management. He switched to advertising in 1984 when he worked in several creative and global advertising agencies.

He moved to the U.S. in 1994 where he introduced the discipline of Brand Planning and Strategy to a major agency. He became Chairman of the U.S. Account Planning Group, the national body of Brand Strategists. He helped launch that now-famous cult brand, jetBlue.

He has combined his passion and expertise in community and branding by joining Meetup Inc, where he is responsible for the Community experience on and offline, Marketing and Partnerships with Brands.

He has been featured on the celebrated PBS Frontline documentary 'The Persuaders' and contributed to many publications including Forbes, Fast Company and Business Week.

The Wall Street Journal called his book "unusually interesting and readable". Seth Godin, author of 'The Purple Cow', described it as "a breakthrough book that will make you rethink what you thought you knew about brands (and religion!). I loved this book. Buy a copy now and be saved!" The Culting of Brands has been translated into several languages including Chinese, Korean, Spanish and Russian.

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LINKS:

FRONTLINE INTERVIEW:
http://www.pbs.org/wg...

ON YOUTUBE:
http://www.youtube.co...

'THE CULTING OF BRANDS' AT POWELL'S BOOKS:
http://www.powells.co...

'THE CULTING OF BRANDS' AT AMAZON.COM:
http://www.amazon.com...

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See you all there!
-Phil