Anyone with an interest of the future of the media should read Meatball Sundae by Seth Godin. Full of insight, it’s a easy-to-read toolkit for modern marketing, and like it or not, everyone, from a freelance writer to a magazine editor is in the business of marketing: either themselves, their ideas or their products.

Seth Godin

Here is an excerpt from my interview of Godin. The complete interview is also available.

Morris: Your blog, http://sethgodin.typepad.com, is one of the most popular and deservedly so. What do you know now about blogging that you wish you knew when you launched it?

Godin: I figured out most of what I know about blogging pretty early on. The thing that distracted me for a long time, though, was confusing noisy people with important people. I know how, for example, to write a blog post that gets a lot of traffic, a lot of discussion–but not necessarily the kind of people I want to reach or the kind of message I want to spread. So now, I write what I think needs to be written, not what the in-crowd necessarily wants to read.

Morris: Here’s a related question. What are two or three of the most common misconceptions about blogging? In fact, what is the reality?

Godin: Blogging isn’t tweeting. At least for me, blogging is an asynchronous essay, a chance to lay out a thought, gather direct, non-anonymous feedback and repeat. It’s not a conversation, because a conversation happens like a phone call–in synchronization–and it is almost between two people. I love the fact that I don’t have to wait a year for a book to come out in order to bring an idea to the world.

The fact that there’s no barrier to publication, though, makes a lot of people uncomfortable. That’s because they can’t hide. You just have to do it, no one to blame.

Morris: Robert Putnam has written that we are increasingly “bowling alone,” losing many of our voluntary associations with others. Yet, you have written of the rise of “tribes,” and described how people are finding each other and creating their own tribes. I agree. But can the interests and objectives of tribes be so narrow that their proliferation creates even more divisions within our society?

Godin: There have always been divisions. 150 people and [Robin] Dunbar says we spin off a new tribe. There was a division between the Lions and Kiwanis, between the Sharks and the Jets and between the Montagues and the Capulets. The thing about Tribes is that people desperately want to belong to them, and the problem with bowling is that there’s just too much overhead. Getting into a league as a trusted member takes about 1000 times as long as doing something similar online, and we just don’t think we have the time for that.

* * *

If you wish to read the complete interview, please contact me at interllect@mindspting.com.

You are urged to check out the resources at these Web sites:

http://sethgodin.typepad.com/about.html

Not along ago, I blogged about the rise of right brainers and the book “A Whole New Brain” by Daniel Pink. I told you there is something important going on and I’d keep talking about it in this space because the Creative Class is taking over the world and I want to be your revered leader and President for life. (Ok, I’ll settle for selling you some books and getting paid to speak to you).

If you look to the right, you’ll see I offer links to my other places on the web, and I only (currently) link to one blog, Seth Godin’s. Seth understands marketing and what he has to say has quite a bit of bearing on how our revolution is working.

Meatball Sundae is about putting fancy toppings on something not designed to have fancy toppings. Specifically, he is talking about using the new internet, Web 2.0, to sell old established products, products designed to be sold through mass marketing. Meatballs are staples, existing products that no amount of sweet toppings will enhance. Companies who are successful using the new web, in other words, are not selling old products, they are asking a very important question,

“How can I create new product to capitalize on the web.”

Here’s why we should listen to Seth: As I’ve written here before, the way people buy things has changed forever. Advertising that “interrupts” us is going away. People who filter and parcel out information are going away. You can reach your market directly now, you can find them and you can have a group of buyers that is unique to YOU. My buyers are NOT yours and vice versa, the idea of advertising to everyone en masse is gone forever, you target your clients, target them with a laser.

Meatball Sundae, Purple Cow, All Marketers Are Liars and the rest of Seth’s work, including his blog, tell us (and big companies) that we live in an age After Advertising, that we can sell our work without trying to get some editor or gallery owner to buy it. Our work can stand on its own merritt and it is our responsibility to find the buyers. Our word, our opinion can get out there faster than the editor at the New York Times and so can our customer’s opinion. The world is about the democratization of information and NO ONE is more poised to benefit than creatives.

When I started in the financial planning business in the eighties, my branch manager said, “Interesting fact, 2% of the population is mentally ill.” Then he handed me a phone book and said, “Here, go find the 2% of the people who are crazy enough to do business with you,” and he went back into his office. Today, thanks to Web 2.0, you can find those people, the people who will become your fans and clients and you can:

Design Products They WIll Buy.

Find people you can create for. In a DVD package I’m releasing soon, I give an example of a fictitious painter who likes Harley’s. So, he decides to go to Bike Fest in Daytona Beach and set up a booth, he’ll offer to paint portraits of rich guys on their bikes. By selecting a niche with people who will be enthusiastic to give him money for his creation, our hero can use blogs, Facebook, Harley Davidson Dealers and grass roots marketing to get the word out that he is the guy. No gallery owners need apply.

People want to get to know you, they want to know other people are buying from you and that you are not going to screw them over. You don’t find your customers anymore. Nope. YOU DON’T FIND CUSTOMERS ANYMORE!

Your Customers Find You.

I’ve gone on enough for today; I’ll revisit some of Seth’s principals this week, it is imperative that Self Employed and Corporate Artists understand the entire ramification of his work. Like I’ve told you, the revolution is here, grab your pitchfork AND your I Phone!

In this series, Bob Morris poses a key question and then responds to it with material from one or more of the business books he has reviewed for Amazon and Borders.

I think there are several reasons, beginning with the fact that his thinking and writing are so effectively integrated within his prose style, one that I characterize as having “Snap! Crackle! and Pop!” Also, he is a keen observer of what is sometimes referred to as “the family of man,” of human nature, as well as of trends, paradigm shifts, etc. in the contemporary business world. Also, he is an enthusiast, passionate about helping to increase and improve interaction between and among as many people as possible. I think of him as being the Johnny Appleseed of the Information Age. No one invests more time and thought in blogging than he does. No one has done more to encourage and support social communities than he has. Godin publishes a book a year and no two are similar, except for their thought-provoking material and the eloquence with which he presents it. (There are a few common themes, such as the importance of being different but authentic.) I also think he is one of very few business thinkers who possesses what Ernest Hemingway once described as “a built-in, shock-proof crap detector” and he rigorously applies it to his own ideas as well as to others’.

Consider the diversity of his subjects in books published since 1995:

EMarketing: Reaping Profits on the Information Highway
Permission Marketing: Turning Strangers into Friends, and Friends into Customers
Survival Is Not Enough: Zooming, Evolution, and the Future of Your Company
The Big Red Fez: How To Make Any Web Site Better
Unleashing the Ideavirus
Purple Cow: Transform Your Business by Being Remarkable
Free Prize Inside!: The Next Big Marketing Idea
All Marketers Are Liars: The Power of Telling Authentic Stories in a Low-Trust World
The Big Moo: Stop Trying to Be Perfect and Start Being Remarkable
Small Is the New Big: and 193 Other Riffs, Rants, and Remarkable Business Ideas
The Dip: A Little Book That Teaches You When to Quit (and When to Stick)
Meatball Sundae: Is Your Marketing Out of Sync?
Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us

Think of Seth Godin’s mind as a “tool box” in which you will find just about everything you need to “build” success both in your career and in your personal life. How valuable is that?

I urge you to sign up for Seth Godin’s blog at

http://sethgodin.typepad.com/

Comments, questions, requests, or suggestions? Please share them. They will be most welcome and I thank you for them. Best regards, Bob

I am reliably informed by Seth Godin in Meatball Sundae that there are really only three types of blog. I think this one may well fall into the category of “who wants to read about your cat’s operation?” However there is a more nagging question which is – “is it brave, stupid or massively impressive to have LinkedIn my blog?” This is a professional network afterall and I’m pretty sure my blog will not offer those wonderful ten-point plans and five-star steps to this that and the other. I love those, I find them helpful but I think there’s room for some upfront tell it how it is blogging because sometimes your career and professional life just does not fit into – do this, this and this. I’d like to shake up that tips format right off the bat.

Of course brave or stupid does’t  just apply to blogging it applies to – “what was I thinking two years ago when I decided to go solo?” Was I brave or stupid because right now I am getting to know the meaning of “this is really really hard work”. It’s the kind of time when reading back your recommendations on LinkedIn does wonders for reminding you what you’re good at and why you’re doing it in the first place! Honestly, it really helps so thanks to all those colleagues and clients who have sponsored and encouraged my work.

The drive and persistance needed to see yourself through challenging times as a self-employed person is tremendous. If you are self-employed you will know exactly what I mean. It takes the anxiety you might feel as an employed person about job security to a whole new level. Yet I’m somewhat relieved that I will never sack myself so in one respect this is the safest form of employment available! On top of this I’m certain that it’s now hard to turn back. Recent evidence from the wonderful Career Renegade crew found that  95% of entrepreneurs faced with rocky roads ahead, will just keep on rockin’.

So those are my rants and riffs for tonight and I will leave another blogger to turn them into a handy self-employed guide to beating a recession. So am I brave or stupid? Probably both and I kinda like it. I wouldn’t chose to be doing anything else.

This article is two fold as I am going to attach Seth Godin’s blog post today as it relates to one of his books—of which I read “Meatball Sundae”—and Wedgewood China, which he also wrote about in the book and was featured in an article in the New York Times January 9, 09.

I was particularly touched as my parents fine china was made by Wedgewood. During my childhood years my parents in the world of academia entertained regularly and used their china! The parties were legendary in the town of Guelph and are still talked about today by those that are still around to reminisce. We of course as children rarely had the pleasure of using that china but it did get used regularly and now awaits a new generation (us) to use that very china that will no longer be in production. It is a great story with a great history. I do hope that as they move into bankruptcy protection that they find an investor or devise a restructuring plan that will allow this historic company to continue. See Seth’s post below.

The man who invented marketing
This year is the 200th birthday of the grandson of Josiah Wedgwood. That’s the good news. The bad news is that his company has filed for bankruptcy. It’s sad.

When I first wrote about Wedgwood in Meatball Sundae, I was stunned that one man could have created so many innovations so long ago. The Times piece repeats much of what I wrote, but doesn’t go far enough. I hope you’ll check out the book if you haven’t had a chance.

Marketing is being reinvented, and the difference this time is that you have far more resources, that will pay off far more quickly, than Wedgwood ever did. And who knows what your granddaughter will do with your inheritance?

Article from the New York Times Op Ed Contributor Judith Flanders ,to which I shared the title of this post. They Broke It!
THE crystal and ceramics company Waterford Wedgwood, whose roots go back 250 years, has been placed in administration, or what is called bankruptcy protection in the United States. While high manufacturing costs, declining demand for luxury goods and a weak dollar may have precipitated matters, this is not a credit-crunch story — it is a history lesson.

The company is in trouble because it has long forgotten the lessons of one of its founders: Josiah Wedgwood, among the greatest and most innovative retailers the world has ever seen. If the modern operators of Wedgwood, which was merged with Waterford Glass in 1986, had shown a tenth of Josiah’s intuitive grasp, his flair, his zest for selling, it would not now be dying.

Today when most people think of Wedgwood, they think of bridal registries and those dusty-looking blue-and-white jasperware plates that no one knows what to do with. But things were once very different.

Josiah was an unlikely hero. He was the 13th child of an impoverished potter; a childhood case of smallpox left Josiah with a bad leg that was later amputated, making it impossible for him to turn a potter’s wheel. But if he could not physically throw a pot, he could — and did — find new ways to get goods to market. He threw himself into various schemes to improve roads and canals. And, more fundamentally, he developed new ways of selling. Most, if not all, of the common techniques in 20th-century sales — direct mail, money-back guarantees, traveling salesmen, self-service, free delivery, buy one get one free, illustrated catalogues — came from Josiah Wedgwood.

First, of course, came the product. In 1759, Josiah set up a small company in Stoke-on-Trent, in west-central England, to produce earthenware, a cheap, everyday material that was dull, porous and broke easily. But by the 1760s, he made a technical breakthrough and produced “creamware,” a rich, creamy-looking glazed pottery that looked like porcelain but was able to withstand temperature changes. Soon Josiah had even worked out how to print designs on it — all this, at a relatively inexpensive price.

Its worth was quickly recognized: in 1765, Queen Charlotte, the wife of George III, ordered a creamware tea set. For most people, that would be the pinnacle; for Josiah, it was the start. He now called himself “Potter to Her Majesty” and renamed creamware “Queen’s Ware.” In a letter to his business partner, he marveled at “how rapidly the use of it has spread” and “how universally it is liked,” and tried to balance how much this had to do with its royal “introduction” versus “its utility and beauty.”

That is the true Wedgwood. It wasn’t pleasure at past achievement, but instead determination to understand why success had come about, so he could build on it. Selling was an intellectual pleasure, an art form.

No fad was too small. In 1772, when women started bleaching their hands with arsenic to make their skin a fashionable porcelain tone, Wedgwood immediately advertised black teapots: against this background, hands looked even whiter. No cause was too great, either: the company produced emancipation medallions asking, “Am I not a man and a brother?” that were worn as buttons and bracelets.

Until Wedgwood came along, most companies had seen royal commissions as nothing but grief: they were one-offs and, therefore, profits were negligible. When Catherine the Great ordered a 925-piece dinner service in 1773, Wedgwood made perhaps £200 on an outlay of nearly £3,000. But as a marketing tool, the set was beyond price. Each piece had an image of a stately home, and before the order was dispatched, Josiah exhibited it in his showroom so that visitors could see whose houses were immortalized. Naturally, duplicate pieces were available for purchase.

Today, in the Waterford Wedgwood showroom here on Piccadilly the various lines of china are piled up bargain-basement style. While the product is still good, the marketing is dreadful. The company has been both profligate and miserly — it has hired hot designers, but then has scrimped by not spending money to change the molds; as a result, contemporary design is crudely imposed on 100-year-old shapes. Indeed, the company has returned to Josiah’s “diffusion” principle — offering cheaper lines for different segments of the population — but has failed to advertise this fact.

As the news of the company’s travails broke this week, it was clear from Web chatter that most people think Wedgwood is a “luxury” and a “traditional” brand, with no inexpensive lines or innovative designers. Neither is true, but perception, as Josiah knew, is the ultimate truth. Twenty-first century Wedgwood has been more old-fashioned than 18th-century Wedgwood, and that has been its undoing.

Judith Flanders is the author of “Inside the Victorian Home.”

Best Nicole

It’s that time of year to look at yourself and decide your path towards self improvement. I came across Josh Kaufman’s list of the 77 best business books to teach yourself. A kind of Personal MBA initiative. The list is pretty intensive. Of the books that I’ve read in 2008 that are on his list, he made some excellent choices. Books that I’ve especially enjoyed on his list included:

• Made To Stick by Dan & Chip Heath
• The Sales Bible by Jeffrey Gitomer
• Presentation Zen by Garr Reynolds

If you haven’t read those, I would add them as your things to do to make 2009 your best year yet!

I would add to this list:

• Tribes by Seth Godin
• The Levity Effect by Adrian Gostick & Scott Christopher
• Yes!Attitude by Jeffrey Gitomer
• Meatball Sundae by Seth Godin

Seth Godin’s meatball sundae is an unappetizing image with a purpose. Thanks to the nice folks at Citrix, you can get a taste of his presentation here . Godin, the early evangelist for permission marketing, loves to concoct sticky images, like has famous Purple Cow.

“Meatball sundae” refers to the odd concoction that faces many of today’s marketers: The client (internal or external) comes up with a meatball of a product — something of good quality that’s still basically a commodity. Then management asks the marketing team to add the whipped-cream-and-cherry topping of digital marketing.

In the presentation, Godin outlines how Josiah Wedgewood, one of history’s great entrepreneurs and an early brand pioneer, turned a small pottery business into the 18th century’s greatest fortune. He realigned his family’s business brilliantly to take full advantage of exciting new technologies of the time, such as mass production and distribution by rail and sea. 

The moral of the story is that marketers in any age must fully understand and take advantage of the prevailing technologies and trends that shape customer relationships. Wedgewood used advances in industrial production and transportation to spread his business worldwide.

For Revlon, it was print advertising.

For Gillette, it was TV.

For us today, Godin outlines 14 trends that get us out of the meatball trap, most of which result from the overwhelming influence of the Internet, and how it changes our relationship with our customers. 

Marketing junkies may not learn anything new. But Godin articulates it all so clearly, and provides such great context, you might be inspired to incorporate some of his observations and thinking into your own presentations. And these days, whose business couldn’t use a little inspiration?

If you haven’t read the book “Meatball Sundae” from Seth Godin…go get it. While he is the guru of marketing, social media, and new marketing theory…..this book applies to anyone who works in business really. Because the best companies are one with their marketing….their products are an extension of the marketing that is built to lead and serve a community.

Here are the top 10 things I learned from this book:

1) Given enough choices, people will make choices
2) When authentic stories match our world view, we’ll believe it
3) Human nature and new marketing allows us to express that nature
4) Stories spread…not facts
5) We have extremely short attention spans because of massive clutter
6) New marketing says its not an organization, it’s a movement…create a movement around your product or services
7) Ideas that spread through groups of people are more powerful than ideas that are marketed at people
Movements are at the heart of change and growth….more powerful than any advertising
9) The internet has nothing to do with what the movement is, it provides the vehicle for the movement to take place
10) Old style organizations and powerful movements can’t co-exist in the same company…successful marketers will make the distinction and serve a movement.

I’m focussing now on ways to do this through the vehicles our digital worlds provide. It all starts with a great product and/or service. There is a community out there for it. How will you serve them? How will you lead them? How will you equip them to propel the movement?

Enjoy,
~Chris

I’m doing my first video post today, so I hope you’ll cut me a little slack.  If you particularly enjoy the format, leave a comment down below.  I couldn’t say everything I wanted to say without making it into a 12-minute video (the one below is 6 minutes), so I wrote about some of the other points I cut out while editing.

There’s no question that Obama’s marketing campaign was one of the most amazing, grandiose, and well-executed plans in the history of marketing.  But I’m honestly tired of reading about it, so let’s talk about why McCain’s online campaign kinda sucked(*) and how you can avoid his mistakes.

First of all, McCain didn’t have a chance in this election from a marketing standpoint.  You might be thinking, “Oh that’s easy to say now that Obama is president, hindsight’s 20/20, blah blah blah.”  The reason I say that is because Obama was completely congruent with his marketing.  Social networking, texting, Twitter, myBarackObama.com — all this stuff made sense.  It felt like it was a natural extension of what he was trying to accomplish.

McCain’s marketing team, on the other hand, made a completely hollow attempt at some of the stuff Obama was doing.  McCainSpace.com?  Really?  A 72-year old who doesn’t use email has his own social network? Give me a break.  It was totally incongruous with who he was as a person.  And yea, I know that he had to put up something in order to compete with Obama in the online world, but his site sucked compared to his opponent’s.  They didn’t put much effort into setting it up… and it showed.

For instance, a lot of users reported getting error messages when trying to set up their profiles.  Then once you registered with McCainSpace, there wasn’t really anything to do.  You couldn’t pull other people in as easily as you could on myBarackObama, and it wasn’t a great experience.  You didn’t feel like you were truly a part of something once you got in.

Unfortunately for McCain’s team, they were painfully unaware of how effective the internet is at word-of-mouth marketing when it is utilized correctly.  As I said in my last post, online word-of-mouth is the cheapest, easiest, and most effective form of marketing on the planet.  Obama’s team, however (which consisted of one of Facebook’s founders), was intimately familiar with the power and dynamics of social networks and highly filtered data.  They used their site to empower Obama supporters — to enable them to set up meetings, print out certain kinds of flyers, find unregistered voters, etc.  Obama gave his supporters the necessary tools they could use so that his campaign would win from the bottom up, and not the top down.

So what did we learn from the whole experience that you can apply to your company?

McCainSpace was a meatball sundae – it just wasn’t his style.  It was a “me too” marketing attempt just so he could say he was doing what Obama was doing.  Don’t do that.  You don’t need to set up your own social network or have your own viral video just so you can be like your competitor.  Ning, Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, blogs, texting — it’s irrelevant which one you use because they’re just tools.  Highly effective tools, but still just tools.

If a particular form of social media doesn’t mesh with your company and what you’re trying to accomplish, then don’t use it.  If you’re not going to utilize that tool to the fullest extent, then don’t use it.  Don’t make a superficial attempt at something just because others are doing it.  Pick the tools that will work really well for you, that you’ll actually enjoy using frequently, and stick with those.

(*) And just to clarify: I am NOT saying McCain lost solely because of his marketing.  I am saying his marketing efforts weren’t that good.

Hoje no início da noite fui conversar com o pessoal da Sabiá, sobre o que li, aprendi e mais gostei sobre o Seth Godin, a convite do Eduardo Carvalho. Foi uma conversa bacana, inteligente, sobre um tema que gosto muito: marketing com Seth Godin.

Resolvi tentar fazer um resumo rápido das principais idéias aqui, que considero mais relevantes.

Sobre internet

• Internet dá cada vez mais poder ao consumidor.
• Com a internet, blogs, redes sociais, e twitter, fica cada vez mais fácil encontrar pessoas como você, mesmo que distantes geograficamente.

Sobre fazer palestras

• Tenha um bom PowerPoint, use poucas palavras, use boas imagens, não use como tele-prompter, não leia os slides.
• Converse com seu público, mas com muita emoção.

Sobre livros e música

• Livro é souvenir. Vende pelo produto, pela ligação, pelo símbolo. O conteúdo muitas vezes está online, de graça.
• Música é um mercado de fã-clube, de experiências, de relacionamento, de tribos. Não se ganhará mais dinheiro vendendo CDs.

Sobre marketing

• O que tem valor é escasso, e vice-versa.
• interrupção não – propaganda que interrompe e não relevante não funciona cada vez menos.
• permissão sim – propaganda relevante, para seu público, funciona cada dia mais.
• crie um produto marcante, especial, único (vaca roxa), que os clientes aparecerão.
• faça com que seus produtos vaca roxa tenham características que tornem fácil falar sobre eles, mostrar, contar, divulgar, explicar. Ninguém fala de idéias e produtos chatos ou complexos. Torne-os virais.
• Não fale de atributos ou benefícios, conte histórias, que tenham relação com o seu público alvo, e que muito provavelmente não vão agradar a quem não é seu público alvo.
• Escolha seu nicho. Tentar vender para todos é a maneira mais fácil de não vender para ninguém.
• O sucesso está nos extremos, nos nichos. Os carros em falta hoje nos EUA são extremos: Hummer, Mini Cooper, Tesla.
• Não tente usar as novas técnicas de marketing (internet, interação, participação) com um velho mindset (controle, produtos médios para a massa da população).
• Tenha um blog para que as pessoas conheçam você, seu trabalho, suas idéias. Daí você pode vender, arrumar emprego, trabalho.

Sobre vendas

• Um bom produto se vende sozinho.
• Como fazer um livro best-seller? Venda um livro, para alguém que adore seu livro e comece a fazer propaganda boca-a-boca.

Sobre sucesso e fracasso

• Vencedores também desistem, e perdedores também são persistentes. O segredo está em escolher onde persistir e onde desistir. Escolha onde você pode, quer, acredita ser o melhor do mundo. O seu mundo, seu nicho, seu espaço.
• A dificuldade de alcançar o sucesso (The Dip) é o que vai separar os vencedores da massa. Vai criar escassez, vai premiar os vencedores. Quanto mais longo e fundo a “barrigada” do esforço X resultados, maior o prêmio de quem ultrapassa o vale.
• Tenha paciência. O sucesso demora, para chegar, mais do que alguns dias ou semanas.
• Ser pequeno é bom. Pequeno pode significar rapidez, flexibilidade, baixo custo, intimidade com o cliente.
• Tenha foco. Quem vigia dois fogões, dorme sem janta.
• Faça o que gosta, ou aprenda a gostar do que faz. Quem tem sucesso, faz o que gosta (e não tem que fazer).
• Se pergunte no início do dia: O que vou produzir hoje? Ou, o que vou despachar/entregar hoje? Pense em “entregar” um produto acabado todos os dias. Geralmente seu dia, por mais que tenha inúmeras ações, pode ser resumido em bem ou mal sucedido, ao se falar em 1-2 coisas apenas.

Sobre design de sites

• Seja simples.
• Seja objetivo. Apenas um objetivo por página. Ajude quem acessa a encontrar o que quer, e o que você quer.
• Não confunda seu cliente-internauta-usuário.

E ainda, o famoso slide 78 da palestra Meatball Sundae.

E ele é o único guru de marketing que tem um personagem.

Por último: melhor ser um ótimo comunicador, do que um teórico criador de teorias. Melhor saber explicar e facilitar a mudança, do que ser o especialista que estudou a fundo um tema, mas não sabe como transformar em informação útil, aplicável.

Il y a 1 an, j’ai commandé l’audio de Meatball Sundae avant dernier livre de Seth Godin, auteur bien connu en marketing. J’ai écouté environ 1h hier, et j’essayerais de poster sur le blog les trouvailles les plus intéressantes du livre, au fur et à mesure.

Première partie: jusqu’à 57″36

New marketing vs Old Marketing

L’old marketing c’est les publicités à la télé, à la radio… La grosse production de produits moyens conçus pour un public moyen. Il faut que les produits touchent assez de gens pour que la publicité TV soit efficace et rentable.

Le new marketing c’est des produits exceptionnels qui peuvent être vendus très rapidement grâce à une propagation nettement plus rapide de l’information. C’est plus dur de réussir avec le new marketing, mais les succès sont nettement plus retentissants.

La question que les champions du old marketing se posent:

Comment puis-je bénéficier du New Marketing?

Et Seth Godin répond à cela que ce n’est pas la bonne question. C’est le problème du Meatball Sundae. On ne peut pas “gagner” avec le new marketing s’y on aligne pas l’ensemble de son organisation avec les techniques du new marketing. C’est pourquoi tant de grosses entreprises, championnes du old marketing, se sont plantées avec le new marketing.

Parce qu’elles ont ajouté de la chantilly, du coulis de framboise et des cacahètes (le new marketing) sur des boules de viandes (le old marketing), et que tout de suite c’est l’indigestion.

La question qu’il faut se poser:

Comment puis-je adapter l’ensemble de mon organisation pour “gagner” avec les techniques du new marketing?

Quelques exemples que j’ai trouvé bons:

Exemple du Potier wedgewood:
On est en angleterre, il y a bien longtemps, il n’y a pas de marketing, chaque artisan vend ses produits dans son village à un prix bas, le même que tout le monde. Une qualité moyenne, pour des gens moyens à un prix moyen.
Wedgewood fait une formation de potier et il va “inventer” le marketing.

• vendait ses céramiques 40% plus chères que tous les autres
• cassait ses céramiques devant la presse et les clients quand elles n’étaient pas parfaitement réalisées
• donnait à la reine un set à thé, puis brandait celui ci au nom de la reine pour en vendre plein
• marquait toutes ces céramiques
• se mettait aux confluents de deux rivières pour pouvoir vendre dans un rayon plus large à l’époque ou c’était essentiellement de la vente au sein de son village

Il a crée un nouveau marketing et il a adapté son organisation pour qu’elle gagne avec ce nouveau marketing.

Exemple de Ralph Lauren:
Ralph Lauren est une marque synonyme de vente dans des magasins “exclusifs” ralph lauren en ville ou les vendeurs sont presque des tailleurs et les produits extrêmement chers et d’excellente qualité..

Puis c’est la révolution des “malls”, grandes surfaces dans lesquels on trouve de tous, a des prix très compétitifs.

Comment mettre dans un mall un magasin ralph lauren?

… c’est beaucoup trop cher
… On ne peut pas baisser les prix avec des vêtements d’une telle qualité, et un staff ajoutant tant de valeur.

DONC: RL a produit des gammes pour les outlet stores des malls et s’est mis à recruter un nouveau staff plus efficacement et concentré uniquement sur la vente.

Ils ont su développer une activité différente, tellement complémentaire qu’elle a dépassé l’ancien flux de revenus. Mais leur image de qualité a réussi à perdurer.

Ils ont su voir l’opportunité du new marketing et adapter l’organisation.

Une des plus gros changement du new marketing:

“The distance between the marketer’s voice and the consumers’ ears is much much shorter with the new marketing.”

A suivre

I’m asked on a regular basis what do I read to stimulate “engaging the business community” ideas.

Well, I read books…I currently recommend:

• YES!Attitude by Jeffrey Gitomer to develop a bullet-proof positive attitude
• Made To Stick by Chip & Dan Heath to learn how to tell a story and be remembered
• Meatball Sundae by Seth Godin to see how you are giving mixed messages and being unfocused
• The Levity Effect by Adrian Gostick & Scott Christopher to lighten up and become profitable

I read several blogs. Seth Godin provides the most insight. His blog is updated daily (sometimes even more). Today’s post talked about the need to be a leader of a triiibe (purposely spelled incorrectly).

I receive two eZines that are particularly insightful:

First is Jeffrey Gitomer’s weekly Sales eZine. Each week he provides lessons on life through the eyes of the BEST salesperson in the world! He talks about attitude (getting and keeping it) and relationship building (relationships that last beyond the project but for life).

Secondly is a long time favorite by Napoleon Hill Foundation (Think & Grow Rich).  The weekly eZine includes inspirational articles written years ago but are still applicable today.

I attend seminars featuring the best of the best. They cost more but provide the most value. If you want to be the best…learn from them. I’m attending one offered by Seth Godin Wednesday in NYC. How about joining me?

If you ever have the opportunity to see Jeffrey Gitomer … do so! You will understand why he earned the rare award by the National Speakers Association Hall of Fame.

My blogs, eZines, books, and website has thoughts and ideas based upon these works. The instructions of success have been around for decades. I’ve just applied them to Information Technology. They have made me successful. I’ll keep studying and passing the information to you.

I am not a marketer by profession. In fact, if I’m honest I sometimes feel like I don’t really have a clue when it comes to websites, blogs and the whole ideavirus approach to marketing. I think I’m still stuck in the old marketing days – average products, for the mass, advertised in the mass.

So, reading a book like this is refreshing. It is a challenge. It provokes me into thinking differently. It throws out ideas that I would never naturally think about.

As a Pastor in the 21st Century what I am bothered about is making sure the ultimate message continues to create a stir. That it still gets in front of people and has the opportunity to challenge them. Maybe I’m missing the point of the book because of a lack of knowledge but it seems to shout out that ‘old marketing’ doesn’t work like it use to – TV, mass media, putting out your idea in front of everyone and hoping it will find someone who needs. Today, the internet makes it easy to pinpoint the audience first, to speak to a ’slither’ of the mass and hopefully becoming more efficient in the process. This is the world of ‘new marketing’. Ignore it at your peril.

(I hope that’s right)

Anyway…I enjoy Seth Godin books because they are not what I normally read and they throw out new thoughts. Stuff like…

…given the choice, people want the choice (that’s actually from The Long Tail by Chris Anderson)

…it’s not about what you think the market wants, or what you want the market to want. It’s about creating and assembling a collection of goods and services that captures the attention of the people who truly care.

…you can harness the power of thousands of people for very little money. But this is no substitute for honesty, passion and authenticity.

…make something worth talking about; and make it easy to talk about.

Wow. That last one should be a challenge for any Pastor. The message we have never changes but I think we have to make it worth talking about and easy to do that. That’s why we do what we do.

Xcel Church use websites, blogs, youtube and facebook to get the word out. Those who are looking will find us. We are creating opportunities for people to interact with us before they venture into the buildings/venues. The greatest asset we have is everyone who is already a fan – they spread the word more than we do. That is the essence of new marketing (I think).

Buy your copy here. Read it and tell me what you think. Have I completely missed the point – hope not!

Apologies as I’ve not been able to post for a while. I just thought I’d share with you some of the books from my mini-bookshelf.

These days, I’m reading Wikipatterns by Stewart Mader . There are some other very interesting books up on my shelf that have been gifted by amazing wonderful people

Some of the other books that I have are:

Meatball Sundae by Seth Godin

Join the Conversation by Joseph Jaffe

Groundswell by Josh Bernoff & Charlene Li

4 Secrets of High Performing Organizations by Bud Bilanich

Naked Conversations by Robert Scoble & Shel Israel

So, which book you’re reading right now? Which are the ones you’ve read in the recent times?

I just finished reading Seth Godin’s Meatball Sundae.  He really gets you thinking about how you think about marketing. 

We need a new approach in how we market our business. With the internet and all that entails, we can’t work it the old way. Attention spans are shorter, there are more options available, and everyone seems to be going at a faster pace.

Think about it, you can record a show, and fast forward through the commercials – there goes that advertising money! (The Super Bowl commercials are the only ones I look forward to watching.)

“If the New Marketing can be characterized by just one idea, it’s this: Ideas that spread through groups of people are far more powerful than ideas delivered at an individual.”

232 pages of pure, thought provoking, encouraging messages that will have you rethink your thinking!