Seth Godin: ‘Ideas that spread, win’

The ever excellent TED Talks gives us this video of marketing guru Seth Godin holding forth on: “Sliced bread and other marketing delights”.

The key message is that interesting stuff grabs attention and conveys messages better than stuff which ain’t. (Oh and look out for the way that the TED video lets you skip to the sections you want rather than having to watch the whole thing. This gives a time-poor audience the ability to manipulate the content to make it more effective at reaching them. Smart.)

In a world of too many options and too little time, our obvious choice is to ignore the ordinary stuff. Marketing guru Seth Godin spells out why, when it comes getting our attention, bad or bizarre ideas are more successful than boring ones. And early adopters, not the mainstream’s bell curve, are the new sweet spot of the market.

Seth Godin: ‘Ideas that spread, win’

The ever excellent TED Talks gives us this video of marketing guru Seth Godin holding forth on: “Sliced bread and other marketing delights”.

The key message is that interesting stuff grabs attention and conveys messages better than stuff which ain’t. (Oh and look out for the way that the TED video lets you skip to the sections you want rather than having to watch the whole thing. This gives a time-poor audience the ability to manipulate the content to make it more effective at reaching them. Smart.)

In a world of too many options and too little time, our obvious choice is to ignore the ordinary stuff. Marketing guru Seth Godin spells out why, when it comes getting our attention, bad or bizarre ideas are more successful than boring ones. And early adopters, not the mainstream’s bell curve, are the new sweet spot of the market.

Marketing guru Seth Godin on content

Juntajoe reports on an audio seminar by Seth Godin, as part of his Meatball Sundae Book Tour. Here’s some key points.

1. The old way of marketing is where producers talked at customers with consistent interruption. New marketing is about connecting with customers.
2. Today’s new marketing is a bigger opportunity than any revolution that came along before (Factory, Industrial revolution) because people only need access to ideas, not access to large amounts of capital.
3. Instead of spending $5 million on advertising, spend $5 million on a great product that people want to talk about.
4. There is a difference between how many and who. Old marketing was about how many. New marketing is about who. If 12 people are coming to your blog, but they are the right 12 people with large amounts of buying power, that’s what matters.
5. Permission transferred is permission lost.
6. Your content: Who is listening? Make something for them. If you make something that solves their problems, they’ll talk about it and tell others.
7. The gatekeepers have changed. Today’s technology has enabled the destruction of old gatekeepers (have a message to tell and can’t get it out… create a blog then) and the creation of new gatekeepers (those that have 1,000 friends on Facebook).
8. Figure out why the target needs to pay attention to you? Find information they desperately need (books, blog, research, surveys, etc.) and give it to them. This is the heart of new marketing.
9. Telling an authentic story means living an authentic life (i.e., Howard Schultz, Starbucks CEO really does love coffee). In the new marketing world, you can’t fake it, so you have no choice but to be real.
10. All one has to do to understand new marketing is to start a blog. Write stuff that people want to read instead of dictating to them. You learn the lesson quickly!