Brain Rules (John Medina, 2008) 8.0/10
How We Decide (Jonah Lehrer, 2009) 8.2/10
How The Mighty Fall (Jim Collins, 2009) 6.7/10
World Wide Rave (David Meerman Scott, 2009) 7.2/10
The Element (Sir Ken Robinson, 2009) 8.2/10
Jeff Immelt and the New GE Way (David Magee, 2009) 5.0/10
The Talent Code (Daniel Coyle, 2009) 6.5/10
Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion (Robert B. Cialdini, 2007) 7.0/10
The Ten Commandments for Business Failure (Donald R. Keough, 2008) 7.3/10
The Little Book of Bull Moves in Bear Markets (Peter D. Schiff, 2008) 5.2/10
The Brand Bubble (John Gerzema and Ed Lebar, 2008) 6.0/10
A Sense Of Urgency (John P. Kotter, 2008) 6.5/10
Who (Geoff Smart and Randy Street, 2008) 6.8/10
Reality Check (Guy Kawasaki, 2008) 7.2/10
Tribes (Seth Godin, 2008) 4.7/10
Talent (Edward E. Lawler III, 2008) 5.8/10
Business Stripped Bare (Richard Branson, 2008) 7.8/10
Call Me Ted (Ted Turner with Bill Burke, 2008)
Outliers (Malcolm Gladwell, 2008) 6.0/10
Winning (Jack Welch with Suzy Welch, 2005) 8.0/10
Tuned In (Craig Stull, Phil Myers & David Meerman Scott, 2008) 7.2/10
Inside Steve's Brain (Leander Kahney, 2008) 6.0/10
Yes! (Robert Cialdini, et al, 2008) 6.7/10
The Answer (John Assaraf & Murray Smith, 2008) 7.2/10
Six Disciplines Execution Revolution (Gary Harpst, 2008) 4.0/10
The Future of Management (Gary Hamel and Bill Breen, 2008) 7.3/10
Business as usual isn’t working anymore.
Seth Godin portrays the orthodox business practice trying to embrace the New Marketing as “Meatball Sundae”. Meatball is straightforward and ubiquitious. The New Marketing is whipped cream and a cherry
Part 1 speaks out the difference between the old marketing (mass media, TV, command-and-control) and The New Marketing (fashion, stories, permission and promises)
The highlight of the book is in Part 2, The Fourteen Trends
Trend1: Direct Communication and Commerce Between Producers and Consumers
Trend2: Amplification of the Voice of the Consumer and Independent Authorities
Trend3: Need for an Authentic Story as The Number of Sources Increases
Trend4: Extremely Short Attention Spans Due to Clutter
Trend5: The Long Tail
Trend6: Outsourcing
Trend7: Googl and The Dicing of Everything
Trend8: Infinite Channels of Communication
Trend9: Direct Communication and Commerce Between Consumers and Consumers
Trend10: The Shifts in Scarcity and Abundance
Trend11: The Triumph og Big Ideas
Trend12: The Shift From “How Many” to “Who”
Trend13: The Wealthy Are Like Us
Trend14: New Gatekeepers, No Gatekeepers
Part 3 is “Putting It Together”, it is basically the conclusion with some nice case studies in the final part
What I’m going to tell you is the breakdown of the dimensions of the content of the book into six dimensions: ease of understanding (how easy it is to understand), distinction (how unique it is), practicality (can it be done?), credibility (does it sound true and real or is it from out of nowhere?), insight (Is it deep of is it shallow?), and reading experience
If a book is easy to understand, distinct, practical, credible, insightful, and provides great reading experience, I consider it an excellent book.
Meatball Sundae:
Ease of Understanding: 8/10: Seth wrote it very simply, each part is divided into small sections (blog-like) instead of a long chapter. 2 points taken due to a maximum use of technological stuffs which can be hard to understand by brick-and-mortar marketers unless he or she read it with an online computer.
Distinction: 7/10: There have been books already about these trends, The Long Tail, far too many books on outsourcing and these technological trends, a famous The World is Flat by Thomas Friedman offers a great insight on this. However, Seth Godin is magical in the sense that he can thread and tie them together.
Practicality: 5/10: Although there are many new and fun things to learn and the 14 trends, he did not offer much on how to ride the trend. I now have a blog, subscribed to Twitter, Squidoo, etc. Now what? The stories mostly stop there
Credibility: 8/10: Seth’s words are honest and real, he wrote about blogs and communication and he is the master at it with examples of successes and failures and a long lists of examples from other sources in a small book.
Insight: 5/10: Since the book is divided into many small chunks, there is no subject that is deep. It is understandable though, this is no Philip Kotler’s textbook.
Experience: 9/10: This book is fun. My feeling was like sitting with Seth Godin himself while he shows me what’s in his laptop and what should we do with our browser.
Overall: 7/10: A very good book on how marketing is and will be and the trends changing the marketing landscape forever but too little on the spot on methods and how-tos.
November 1st, 2008 at 5:20 am
[...] Tedded.net put an intriguing blog post on Review: Meatball Sundae (Seth Godin, 2007)Here’s a quick overview [...]
November 1st, 2008 at 6:11 am
[...] Original post by Tedded.net [...]
January 26th, 2009 at 8:22 am
[...] Book Reviews Talent (Edward E. Lawler III, 2008) 5.8/10 Business Stripped Bare (Richard Branson, 2008) 7.8/10 Call Me Ted (Ted Turner with Bill Burke, 2008) Outliers (Malcolm Gladwell, 2008) 6.0/10 Winning (Jack Welch with Suzy Welch, 2005) 8.0/10 Tuned In (Craig Stull, Phil Myers & David Meerman Scott, 2008) 7.2/10 Inside Steve’s Brain (Leander Kahney, 2008) 6.0/10 Yes! (Robert Cialdini, et al, 2008) 6.7/10 The Answer (John Assaraf & Murray Smith, 2008) 7.2/10 Six Disciplines Execution Revolution (Gary Harpst, 2008) 4.0/10 The Future of Management (Gary Hamel and Bill Breen, 2008) 7.3/10 Meatball Sundae (Seth Godin, 2007) 7.0/10 [...]