I’m in two minds about Seth Godin. He’s either quite a marketing genius or just a one-trick pony with a clever turn of phrase. Either way I found this book readable (actually “listenable” as an audiobook) and it stimulated further thought for me in my day job (running a mom and pop English school in Japan), my side gig (a random book club) and my future “retirement” business (yet to be decided but involving books, art and coffee). His big idea is that marketing should be permission based and that as a small fish in a big pond, you would probably be better off first looking to find a smaller pond than becoming a bigger fish. His ideas on social media (that it is digital share cropping) and that good marketing is about telling the right story to the right people resonated with me. That doing a great job is a prerequisite before any marketing can do its work was sound. Worth a read or a listen if you think there must be more to marketing than buying ads or shouting “Buy My Stuff!” online.
No. 5 of 100 books I intend to read and review in 2020.
* * *
Patrick Sherriff, an Englishman who survived 13 years working for newspapers in the US, UK and Japan. Between teaching English lessons at his conversation school in Abiko, Japan, with his wife, he writes and illustrates textbooks for non-native speakers of English, releases Hana Walker mystery novels, short stories, essays and a monthly newsletter highlighting good fiction published in English about Japan. Saku’s Random Book Club is his latest project to spend more time with books.
Patrick Sherriff 