Thinkers You NEED to Know - Seth Godin
Posted by Thom Byxbe | Under Outside The Box, Series, Thinkers, Thought Friday Mar 28, 2008EDITORS NOTE: This is the initial post in a new on-going series entitled "Thinkers You NEED To Know." In my post, "Such A Crazy Idea Couldn’t Possibly Be True, Could It?", I stated:
To see the potential in this story requires one to do some “Outside The Box” thinking. This is something that I feel it is our duty at CITB to encourage.
I believe one of the BEST ways for CITB encourage “Outside The Box” thinking is to provide EXCELLENT examples. That is the purpose of this new series. We will focus on current living and tested innovative thinkers. NOT conceptual thinkers, but individuals who have demonstrated practical functional, “Outside The Box” thinking.
The other day I re-discovered Seth Godin. Seth has been around the Internet for a LONG time. Why is he the subject of our inaugural post in the "Thinkers You NEED To Know" series? Here are SOME of his accomplishments:
- Writes the world's most popular marketing blog
- Authored nine best-sellers
- Meatball Sundae
- The Dip
- Small Is the New Big
- The Big Moo
- Purple Cow
- All Marketers Are Liars
- Free Prize Inside
- Survival Is Not Enough
- Permission Marketing
- Unleashing the Ideavirus
- The Big Red Fez
- Founder and CEO of Yoyodyne, the interactive direct marketing company acquired by Yahoo! in 1998
- Founded the "Recommendation Network" website Squidoo
Daily he helps adjust the way people think about change, marketing and work processes. He is highly respected for his intricate understanding of the Internet. Seth has lead in helping to define not only the Internet's processes, but a large chunk of its marketing vocabulary. Here is an example of how he coined the term "permission marketing", and defined a basic concept of the Internet today.
Advertisements on TV and Radio are classified as "interruption marketing", which interrupt the customer while he is doing something of his preference. Godin introduced the concept of "permission marketing", where the business provides something of value to the customer and obtains his permission, and then does marketing.
Godin combines three elements in his writings.
- The end of the "TV-Industrial complex" means that marketers no longer have the power to command the attention of anyone they choose, whenever they choose.
- In a marketplace in which consumers have more power, marketers must show more respect; this means no spam, no deceit and a bias for keeping promises.
- He asserts that the only way to spread the word about an idea is for that idea to earn the buzz by being remarkable.
Godin refers to those who spread these ideas as "Sneezers", and to the ideas being spread as "IdeaViruses." He calls a remarkable product or service a purple cow. Yahoo! currently has a model of a purple cow in the lobby of its Sunnyvale campus.
SETH'S PHILOSOPHY in his own words...
For fifty years, advertising drove our economy. Then media exploded. We went from three channels to five hundred, from no web pages to a billion. Suddenly there are more than 100 brands of nationally advertised water. There are dozens of car companies, selling thousands of combinations. Starbucks offers 19,000,000 different ways to order a beverage, and Oreo cookies now come in more than nineteen flavors.
In the face of all this choice and clutter, consumers realized that they have quite a bit of power. So advertising stopped working.
One insight is that marketing with permission works better than spam. In other words, delivering anticipated, personal and relevant ads to the people who want to get them is always more effective than yelling loudly at strangers. PERMISSION MARKETING addresses this issue.
Once an idea is in the hands of people who care about its success, it may be lucky enough to benefit from digitally augmented word of mouth. I call this an ideavirus. Modern ideas spread online and off, and this is faster and more effective than the old-fashioned centralized way of selling. "UNLEASHING THE IDEAVIRUS" is the most successful ebook of all time and you can buy the paperback for about $10.
Download "UNLEASHING THE IDEAVIRUS" - Absolutely FREE by right clicking here.
It's remarkable products that get remarked on. That seems obvious, but it flies in the face of the way most goods and services and business items are created and marketed. Boring is invisible.
The thing that makes something remarkable isn't usually directly related to the original purpose of the product or service. It's the FREE PRIZE INSIDE, the extra stuff, the stylish bonus, the design or the remarkable service or pricing that makes people talk about it and spread the word.
Seth's controversial book, ALL MARKETERS ARE LIARS, isn't about lying at all. It's about telling stories that people want to believe. It's about the fact that people want bottled water, not tap; iPod Nanos, not Rios; and politicians who talk straight, regardless of the consequences... But most of all, it's about authenticity.
I believe that it's possible to enjoy your job, to do the right thing, to be transparent, to give more than you get and to be successful, all at the same time. In fact, that's sort of the definition of success, isn't it?
TOP 7 "SETH'S BLOG" POSTS OF ALL TIME
Small is the new big - How the net turns the advantage of the mighty upside down.
Don't shave that yak! - How to get things done.
What makes an idea viral? - How ideas spread.
Beware the CEO Blog - Well, beware the bad ones, anyway.
The new digital divide - It's about attitude, not bandwidth.
Two kinds of writing - For strangers and for friends, of course.
Death plus a fine - Just a photo.
There is a lot of history and substance to this man. We at CITB believe Seth Godin is one of the great "Thinkers You NEED To Know."
CITB Quote of the day: Tags: blog, Business, change, Concept, design, free, fun, History, images, online, Quote, Thinking, web, Yahoo
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