Branding, Marketing, & Advertising
May
I’ve been re-reading and re-listening to my Seth Godin book and audio book library these last few weeks and one of the reoccurring themes Seth talks about over and over again is the vital importance of being "remarkable" and is the fundamental concept in his book Purple Cow: Transform Your Business by Being Remarkable (a brown cow isn’t remarkable, a purple cow is so you remember it and talk about it).
And today when I was searching for an old Inc magazine article on the Inc web site I ran across another article I thought was interesting an apropos regarding being "remarkable." In ask Robert Stephens (Stephens is the founder of Geek Squad, a tech-support company that was acquired by Best Buy in 2002) Stephens answers t a question put to him:
"I want to generate buzz about my executive search firm among potential clients. What is the best way to boost word-of-mouth marketing?"
Stephens reply is a great one and I give you this link so you can read it on the Inc site but towards the end he said something that really caught my attention:
Advertising is the tax you pay for being unremarkable.
So I’m thinking of now here in 2010 and beyond how can builders and remodelers stand out from the crowd by being remarkable?
For some suggesting on how to get unstuck and moving on the road to becoming remarkable a quick list of things to consider read Seth Godin post on his blog: Seth’s Blog: How to be remarkable. In fact subscribe to his blog and read it religiously, go out and search for his videos on YouTube, Vimeo and wherever else they may be and watch them and and buy his books and audio-books
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Feb
I’ve been tracking the upcoming release of the book ReWork by the folks at 37Signals.com and today on their blog they published REWORK Trailer 1: Staying Late
After looking at that trailer I clicked through to Amazon to per-order my copy and I found Amazon had one of those ‘people who bought this book also bought‘ groupings that I thought would be a great one.
ReWork
We have of course ReWork form the people at 37 Signals which is a collection of essays where they discuss the business & management philosophies at the core of 37signals’ success (a full list of the essays can be found here). For anyone who doesn’t recognize the name 37signals they are the developers behind the online project management tools Basecamp®, Highrise®, Backpack®, and Campfire™ and if you read their blog you would know why this is a book to look forward to. One of my favorite marketing authors Seth Godin (who’s new book I will get to in a minute) had this to say about ReWork:
This book will make you uncomfortable.
Depending on what you do all day, it might make you extremely uncomfortable.
That’s a very good thing, because you deserve it. We all do.
Jason and David have broken all the rules and won. Again and again they’ve demonstrated that the regular way isn’t necessarily the right way. They just don’t say it, they do it. And they do it better than just about anyone has any right to expect.
This book is short, fast, sharp and ready to make a difference. It takes no prisoners, spares no quarter and gives you no place to hide, all at the same time.
There, my review is almost as long as the first chapter of the book. I can’t imagine what possible excuse you can dream up for not buying this book for every single person you work with, right now.
Stop reading the review. Buy the book
Crush It
And it was that journey onto the Amazon site that pointed out another book to me that piques my curiosity, Crush It!: Why NOW Is the Time to Cash In on Your Passion by Gary Vaynerchuk. Gary Vaynerchuk (wikipedia) in case you haven’t heard him or heard of him is the voice of Wine Library TV: Gary Vaynerchuk’s daily wine video blog. As I read the Amazon page on Vaynerchuk’s new book I read a bunch of things that attracted me but the clincher was:
Learn: Why storytelling is the most important business concept in the current marketplace.
That harkens back again to my attraction to the message in Seth Godin’s classic book All Marketers Are Liars: The Power of Telling Authentic Stories in a Low-Trust World. which I wrote about here back in August of 2005 which in a nutshell was telling authentic genuine stories are at the heart of great marketing and . . . and our belief in those stories makes them true. I truly enjoy watching the passionate and excited stories that Vaynerchuk tells us about wine in his video podcasts (and I don’t even drink!) so I want to hear what he has to say on the subject
Linchpin
Linchpin: Are You Indispensable is the latest from Seth Godin and whenever Seth Godin talks (writes) listen. It looks to me as though with Linchpin we get Godin’s takes on personal branding. How to be a indispensable member of a tribe (Tribes, was Godin last book) . A linchpin is the person that hold things together and keeps a group or organization on an even keel and working together. A linchpin is that indispensable member an organization.
The Four Hour Work Week Expanded and Updated
I wrote about the original 4-Hour Workweek a while back in my post on Relative Income and the book has now been revised, expanded, updated, and republished as The 4-Hour Workweek, Expanded and Updated: Expanded and Updated, With Over 100 New Pages of Cutting-Edge Content.
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Quietly Re-Thinking Out Loud: Exploring New Paradigms for How We Manage What We Build
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Jerrald Hayes' Blog: A collection of thoughts and ideas on the state of the Building and Remodeling industry and it's future with regard to: Technology, Project Management, CRM, Business Models,Critical Chain Project Management (CCPM), The Theory of Constraints (TOC), Systems Thinking, JIT, TQM, Lean Construction, CPM and the Lead Carpenter System.
