#31/111: UnMarketing

What is it about?

How do you really please your customer? Start engaging. Scott Stratten shows why it is important to talk with your customer and how you can use social media to take it to the next level.

Key points?

Look out for big fishes: If you aren’t big on twitter or in the blogosphere, look for the influencers in your industry. Who are they and what do they talk about? If you can WOW them, they will probably be pleased and will do great marketing for you. For example, Stratten posted on twitter that he was looking for sandals. Rockport sent a message to him, asking if he wants a pair. After some weeks he received three different pairs for free. Of course he was astonished and decided to write about his experience. This is great marketing!

Pull and stay: Try to get someone information (e.g. email address) of your customers and build a constant stream of useful information. The second part is the important one. Often people collect a lot of business cards which will never be read again. He recommends to write within 24h to the persons and begin a steady relationship.

Try to eliminate your assumptions: If you act with persons, it’s important that you try to treat everybody the same. Especially if you work face-to-face it can be hard. However, behind this old lady could be a CEO of a big company. A young student could have his own startup, etc. If you or your employees are arrogant just because someone doesn’t look like a billionaire, your company won’t exist very long.

Conclusion

UnMarketing is a pretty solid book. Scott Stratten writes some chapters (of 56) about social media and twitter but I don’t think that this is the important information. More important are his experiences about great and poor customer service. You’ll almost never know who your prospect is and who he knows.

By the way, the back cover is really nice.

#7/111: The New Rules of Marketing & PR

What is it about?

In the first half of this book, David Meerman Scott explains different platforms, e.g. blogs, news releases or social networking. In the second half he writes about planning your marketing strategy and tips for execute them on these platforms.

Key points?

Segment your customers. Do not try to sell your product instead try to help your (prospective) customer. Give away valuable content and establish a relationship to your online community.

Conclusion

The first half is not that interesting for people who are not so new to the web. The second half includes some nice ideas. E.g. customer persona, i.e. you take one individual of your market segment and build a story for this individual. Also tips on individual topics like getting press coverage are quite useful.

#3/111: Crush It!

What is it about?

Gary Vaynerchuck, wine lover, writes about his passion for social media marketing. He tells us about how he learned to do business in his dad’s liquid store or with selling baseball cards. Furthermore he gives a brief introduction to different forms of social media marketing and building his own personal brand.

Key points?

Write about your passion. Be extremely good at it and take it to the web.

Conclusion

It is somehow too light for an real marketing book, but too focused on marketing for an autobiography.