As marketers, it’s easy to indulge in the odd bit of bluffing. We reel off famous concepts and ideas from classic marketing books that have become part of our industry’s vocabulary, despite never taking the time to read those books for ourselves. We almost always get away with it – because most of the people we’re talking to haven’t read this stuff either.
I’m not writing this post to criticise – but rather to point out what we’re missing. When we claim to read original marketing thinking based on our topline understanding of it, we miss out on a wealth of insight and inspiration that made these books classics in the first place. If you’re like me, and you’ve never gotten around to reading some of the most influential books in marketing history – then why not make this the year that you do. Here, in chronological order, are 12 that I genuinely believe any marketer should make time for – one for every month of the year:
Positioning – the Battle for your Mind
By Al Ries and Jack Trout
First published in 1981
“A product is something made in a factory. A brand is something made in the mind. To be successful today, you have to build brands, not products.” That’s how Ries and Trout introduced the concept of brand positioning back in 1981. It’s debateable whether anybody has ever written a more important book about the fundamentals of marketing since. If you ever want to remind yourself what we marketers do and why we do it, it’s worth immersing yourself in this original, influential and ever-relevant piece of thinking.
Guerrilla Marketing
By Jay Conrad Levinson
First published in 1983
If you are a marketer for a small business – or any business with limited resources – then I guarantee you’ll have either used the phrase “guerrilla marketing” or thought about your strategy with that concept in mind. But have you read the book the term originally comes from? If you haven’t then you are tackling the unique challenges of finding innovative ways to fight for market share with one hand tied behind your back.
Before he became one of the most influential marketing writers of all time, Jay Conrad Levinson (who passed away in 2013) was a hugely successful advertising executive at J Walter Thompson. He filled this bestseller (which has sold more than 14 million copies) with very practical, tangible ideas and principles for driving results through unconventional means. When he updated it in 2007, he added far more to fit the digital age we were entering. So don’t just imagine yourself as a guerrilla marketer – read the book and become one.
Ogilvy on Advertising
By David Ogilvy
First published in 1983
In many ways this feels like the most dated book on this list – but it’s also, in just as many ways, the most timeless. If your understanding of the golden age of advertising is basically cribbed from episodes of Mad Men, then it’s worth making some time for this classic from one of the undisputed masters of the craft. Ogilvy’s mantra of creative brilliance, research, actual results and professional discipline is as relevant to marketing now as it ever has been. However, what makes this book a truly essential read is the turn of phrase that few other marketing writers can match: “Any fool can write a bad advertisement, but it takes a genius to keep his hands off a good one”, “Committees can criticise, but they cannot create”, “Back your winners, and abandon your losers” – these are the beautifully expressed ideas that still inspire the best marketers. And there are plenty more where they came from.
Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion
By Robert B. Cialdini
First published in 1984
Cialdini wrote his 1984 study of persuasion and marketing partly by spending three years working in telemarketing firms, second-hand car dealerships and charity organisations. Those unique field experiences helped him to develop insights that were years ahead of their time – and root them in actual observation of how people can most effectively be persuaded. Influence helped to establish concepts like the Scarcity Principle and Social Proof. It discusses ideas later popularised by neuroscience such as the fact that “people seem to be more motivated by the thought of losing something than by the thought of gaining something of equal value.”
These are all great reasons to read a fantastic book. However, if you’re a B2B marketer, then there’s an even more compelling one. Cialdini’s ideas are just as relevant to sales as they are to marketing – and they demonstrate the common ground that should naturally exist between the two disciplines. For that reason, as for many others, it’s an inspiring read.
Crossing the Chasm
By Geoffrey A. Moore
First published in 1991
If you spend a lot of time talking about the difference between ‘early adopters’ and the ‘early majority’ then you are channeling the thinking of this phenomenal bestseller from a quarter of a century ago. Despite writing at a time before mobile phones really existed, and when Google, Facebook and LinkedIn were barely twinkles in their founders’ imaginations, Moore absolutely nailed the key marketing and business challenges for innovative products seeking to make it in the mainstream.
You almost certainly know the basic concept: that the transition from being a choice of ‘visionaries’ to being the choice of ‘pragmatists’ is the critical one for new products to make. Read the book in full though, and you’ll discover much more: a clear roadmap for breaking into the mainstream – and an argument for why marketing needs to take the lead in doing so. You’ll also tap into a wealth of other thinking on innovation that Moore draws from (including Diffusion of Innovations by Everett Rogers, which first coined terms like ‘early adopters’ back in 1962).
The Tipping Point
By Malcolm Gladwell
First published in 2000
The title of this book is a lot more famous than the subtitle – and that’s what gives away the fact that a lot more people talk about The Tipping Point than have actually read it. Malcolm Gladwell’s massive bestseller from 2000 isn’t just about “that magic moment when an idea, trend, or social behavior crosses a threshold, tips, and spreads like wildfire”. It’s also about the often-unexpected way this actually happens – How Little Things can Make a Big Difference. It’s real subject is how changing the world, changing how people think and feel, is a lot more manageable than it appears to be. You just have to find the right people – and the right ‘sticky’ concepts. This is an essentially empowering and inspiring call-to-arms for any marketer – and Gladwell’s hugely engaging writing style makes it an un-put-downable read.
Permission Marketing
By Seth Godin
First published in 2004
This was the book and the writer that first stressed the difference between traditional, ‘Interruption Marketing’ and a new approach: giving audiences content they actively want to consume. Writing at the dawn of the social media age, in 2004, Seth Godin anticipated how a new type of platform could transform the nature of marketing. Concepts from inbound marketing to content marketing, to the subscription-based models of businesses like Dollar Shave Club owe a huge amount to his thinking.
Like any hugely influential concept, the trouble with ‘Permission Marketing’ is that it gets repeated so often that it’s in danger of losing its meaning. It’s easy for marketers to assume that an email address or a tick in a box on a form is all the permission they need to bombard their customers. That’s not the message of this book at all – it’s an argument for continually earning permission through consistency and quality. That’s why it’s a great idea to really read (or re-read) it this year.
The Long Tail
By Chris Anderson
First published in 2006
Like Guerrilla Marketing, ‘the long tail’ is a phrase thousands of marketers use on a daily basis, without ever having read the book that it comes from. It’s worth correcting that in 2017 – because The Long Tail (by Wired Editor-in-Chief Chris Anderson) remains one of the best summaries of the fundamentally disruptive nature of eCommerce. Once upon a time, the success of a retailer depended on stocking hit products that would sell in huge quantities – now, with the limitations of shelf space removed, that’s no longer the case. Catering to niche audiences with niche products is now a viable way to build a successful business. It’s changing business models but it’s also changing expectations of brands.
The New Rules of Marketing and PR
By David Meerman Scott
First published in 2007
A hugely practical handbook for bringing together the disciplines and skill sets that you need to negotiate a new marketing landscape. This is a book that’s simply not worth bluffing about having read – because the value is all in the details. It’s written for the digital and social media age with great advice for making effective use of everything from Pinterest and Instagram to YouTube, Twitter and LinkedIn.
Buyology
By Martin Lindstrom
First published in 2008
Many are the neuroscience-related books that I could have included on this list: Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahnemann, Nudge by Thaler and Sunstein. However, as a marketer you could arguably get away with understanding the fundamental concepts of those books and not actually reading them. That’s not the case with Martin Lindstrom’s Buyology, which records the results of a unique experiment into the real impact of marketing on consumers’ brains. It’s packed with challenging and unexpected findings – and it brings those serious neurosicentific concepts to life in a way that’s hugely relevant for marketing.
Content Rules
By Ann Handley and C.C. Chapman
First published in 2010
How do you create content that gets audiences excited and delivers value for your business? It’s a question that almost every marketer is asking – and an awful lot of the answers can be found in this book. If content is the most important strategy in marketing at the moment (and I can’t find that many people who disagree) then this is certainly one of the most important books on this list. My favourite quote? “If you aren’t having fun creating content, you’re doing it wrong.”
Content Inc.
By Joe Pulizzi
First published in 2015
If you think this is just another book about content marketing, then I can absolutely guarantee you haven’t actually read it. Content Marketing Institute founder Joe Pulizzi puts forward a new type of business model with content at its core – and packs his book with compelling evidence that it works. Whether you’re starting a business or seeking to build an existing one, this is content marketing thinking that you definitely need to experience first-hand.
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