My son uses Hit Makers when he teaches marketing to university students, so I thought it must have some pretty interesting and applicable insights. Interesting, yes? Applicable, not so much. That’s not a fault of the book, but rather the nature of the problem.
In the preface, the author called me out: “In our desperate search for simplicity, people want success to work like a garage door opener, where a four-number code springs the lock. But culture is not a keypad, and people are not doors. … Designing for humans means abandoning the childish dream of a universal formula and embracing a more chaotic dance between novelty and wonder, belonging and uniqueness, familiarity and surprise.”
Derek Thompson, a writer for The Atlantic, is a master storyteller. Across 12 chapters plus 4 “interludes”, he tells stories from throughout history that help us understand why some things (songs, movies, artists, etc.) become hits. That’s not to say that the book teaches us how to generate hits. Far from it. Instead, the author gives us a glimpse through the mist to have a slightly better sense of the answer to the perennial question: “Why did that become a hit and not that?”
I found Hit Makers to be a fascinating read. The stories were compelling and the lessons learned from them made sense. While learning these lessons will help marketers make fewer mistakes and perhaps take some steps to increase the likelihood of success, there is no magic formula that will guarantee success.