Book Reviews Archives - Online Marketing Blog

Brian Solis on Lifescale – How to Live a More Creative, Productive and Happy Life Plus Improve Your Marketing

Lee Odden on Mar 7th, 2019
Book Reviews, Interviews

Brian Solis is an award-winning author of 8 books and an internationally known keynote speaker. I’ve had the pleasure of knowing Brian for many years and he has consistently been one of the most thoughtful, inspiring and intelligent people I know.

Not long ago Brian and I had a chance to catch up and he shared with me the news of his new book Lifescale – How to live a more creative, productive and happy life. That’s a pretty compelling title and being up to my neck in digital distractions, multi-tasking and a need to break free out of that chaos, the notion of Lifescale was immediately interesting to me both personally and as a way to better empathize with customers as a marketer.

Brian Solis on Lifescale – How to Live a More Creative, Productive and Happy Life Plus Improve Your Marketing

Book Review: 5 Takeaways From Scott Brinker’s Hacking Marketing + Bonus Author Interview

Ashley Zeckman
Book Reviews, Online Marketing

scott-brinker-book-review

Digital marketing is a very competitive race. The team that is nimble, creative and working smarter will almost always win and keep the business in the end.

Many tools and processes have surfaced over the years that can help marketers improve their efficiency and deliverables. However, there are still many antiquated processes that still exist that may be hindering success.

Scott Brinker’s new book Hacking Marketing: Agile Practices to Make Marketing Smarter, Faster and More Innovative takes a much needed look at the areas of marketing that are broken and ways that they can be fixed.

Book Review: 5 Takeaways From Scott Brinker’s Hacking Marketing + Bonus Author Interview

Book Review X: The Experience When Business Meets Design by @briansolis

Lee Odden
Book Reviews

In the digital marketing world a lot of effort has been invested in the making and promoting of content with a singular emphasis on marketing ROI. But customers don’t care about your “great content”, your “clever marketing” or how much money you make from trying to sell them something.

What do customers care about?

Experiences.

Much has been said recently about consumers and experiences vs. things. According to a Harris Poll/Eventbrite study, 78% of Millenials would choose to spend money on a desirable experience or event over buying something desirable, and 55% of millennials say they’re spending more on events and live experiences than ever before.

The value for experiences over things isn’t necessarily new and certainly applies to all generations. It reminds me of one of my favorite quotes that has an important lesson for brands:

Book Review X: The Experience When Business Meets Design by @briansolis

Book Review & Interview: Meaningful: The Story of Ideas That Fly

Ashley Zeckman
Book Reviews

meaningful-the-story-of-ideas-that-fly For every startup that succeeds, many more fail. But what is it that makes the difference between a successful company, and one that just doesn’t quite hit the mark?

Bernadette Jiwa uncovers that and more in her new book, Meaningful: The Story of Ideas That Fly. According to Jiwa, many companies miss an essential opportunity to focus on the customer story and what they want, and instead focus on the story that they want to tell.

The mix of customers and innovation is a key focus for the book and how those two concepts can be used to change the life of the people that use your products or services.

Book Review & Interview: Meaningful: The Story of Ideas That Fly

Book Review & Interview: Content Inc. by Joe Pulizzi

Ashley Zeckman
Book Reviews, Content Marketing, Online Marketing

Joe-Pulizzi-Content-Inc-Book-Review

The Godfather of Content Marketing has struck gold again. Content Marketing Institute founder Joe Pulizzi has a new book that will hit shelves and Amazon carts this September.

His newest book, Content Inc.: How Entrepreneurs Use Content to Build Massive Audiences and Create Radically Successful Businesses is a delightful blend of inspiration from Joe’s personal experiences building Content Marketing Institute and advice businesses can follow to create an actionable content business model.

Content Inc. takes readers down the logical path from starting their journey, to monetization and creating next-level content.

When the Godfather releases a new piece of content it is always worth a read. If you don’t, you may have to answer to his loyal base of subscribers and followers. Below are some highlights of Content Inc. as well as an exclusive interview with Joe on his new book.

Book Review & Interview: Content Inc. by Joe Pulizzi

Book Review & Interview: Social Content Marketing for Entrepreneurs by Dr. Jim Barry

Ashley Zeckman
Book Reviews, Content Marketing

How many times have you wished that someone would create a textbook filled with why’s and how to’s of digital marketing? If you’re like me, the answer to that is “Too many times to count!”.

Let’s face it, the work that we do and how we do it evolves so quickly it can be hard to keep up. Unfortunately, that leaves room for us to get swept up in “shiny object syndrome” and lose sight of what is really important; creating quality content that resonates with your audience and helps solve a business problem.

Dr. Jim Barry’s new book, “Social Content Marketing for Entrepreneurs” helps marketers realign their focus to some of the most impactful inbound marketing strategies.

Book Review & Interview: Social Content Marketing for Entrepreneurs by Dr. Jim Barry

BADASS Book Review: The Content Code by Mark Schaefer

Lee Odden
Book Reviews, Content Marketing

The Content Code

The Content Code: Six essential strategies to ignite your content, your marketing, and your business is the latest book from Mark Schaefer and like The Tao of Twitter and Social Media Explained, it’s a must read.

I’ve known and admired Mark for several years. He is a very generous person and that generosity extends to the knowledge he shares in the content and conversations he’s a part of.

Mark has a valuable ability to take the complexity out of marketing and draw attention to the things you really need to know – and in a way that just makes sense. Let’s face it: marketers are definitely living in an age of increased complexity and information overload. The sheer volume of content now being produced has no chance of being consumed, ala “Content Shock” and businesses are hard pressed to find ways to stand out.

BADASS Book Review: The Content Code by Mark Schaefer

Global Content Marketing – Book Review

Lee Odden
Book Reviews, Content Marketing

Review - Global Content Marketing

The opportunity to attract, engage and persuade buyers through useful content extends to markets on a global scale. But the same rules about content that work at home may not work abroad. Nor the processes and team structures that many content marketing departments are used to.

That’s why resources around content marketing from a global perspective are essential for international companies. Luckily, I know of just such a resource to point you in the right direction.

I first met Pam Didner when liveblogging one her presentations at Content Marketing World. She was at Intel and I had just given a presentation at Intel’s first internal Social Media conference.

Global Content Marketing – Book Review

7 Things I Learned From Dan Schawbel About Personal Branding and Promotion

Nicolette Beard
Book Reviews, Online Marketing

Personal Branding and Promotion Having just finished re-watching the movie, Julie and Julia, I’m struck by how personal blogging has morphed into personal branding over the last decade. Julie Powell launched her food blog, providing readers a daily dose of meal prep and instruction based on The Art of French Cooking, the cookbook that revolutionized American cooking in the 60s.

The movie portrays a 30-year-old governmental worker/writer in various stages of emotional meltdown and marital woe, but, in the end, she triumphs.

Powell dedicated one year to working her way through 524 recipes as an homage to the inimitable Julia Child and also as a means of self-expression and proof that she could (and would) “finish something!” Without trying, Powell created her personal brand via her blog. Her write up in the New York Times generated a wellspring of support from both traditional media and publishing; a book deal and movie became the fruits of her labor.

7 Things I Learned From Dan Schawbel About Personal Branding and Promotion

A Prerequisite for Content Marketing Success – Book Review: Managing Content Marketing

Lee Odden
Book Reviews, Content Marketing, Online Marketing

Managing Content Marketing by Robert Rose & Joe Pulizzi

There are certain books that I find myself recommending to folks on our team and to people I meet at conferences over and over again. These are books I purchase multiple copies of (I give them away and they also seem to disappear).

One book in particular that fits this situation is Managing Content Marketing: The Real-World Guide for Creating Passionate Subscribers to Your Brand by Robert Rose and Joe Pulizzi.

Sure, Robert and Joe are two of the smartest and nicest people I know, but this book really does deserve to be required reading for any organization investing in content to grow their business.

Here’s why:

A Prerequisite for Content Marketing Success – Book Review: Managing Content Marketing