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Bestselling author, Entrepreneur and Agent of change. Seth's blog can be found at http://sethgodin.typepad.com/
January 2010
Sunday January 31, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 6:12AM EST on January 31, 2010
If you've got an idea worth spreading, I hope you'll consider this random assortment of rules. Like all rules, some are made to be broken, but still... You can name your idea anything you like, but a google-friendly name is...
Saturday January 30, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 7:10PM EST on January 30, 2010
I'm thrilled to invite you to a killer evening with the brilliant Steven Pressfield (and me, it's a tag team) at Borders Columbus Circle in New York on Monday, February 8th at 7 pm. It's free but space is pretty...
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:59AM EST on January 30, 2010
PSFK writes about a cafe in Japan with a simple rule: you get what the person before you ordered (and paid for), and the next person gets what you ordered. Take a few moments to think about that. Would you...
Friday January 29, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:59AM EST on January 29, 2010
The work you do when you spread the word or run an ad or invent a policy is likely aimed at one of these four groups. Strangers are customers to be, but not yet Critics are those that would speak...
Thursday January 28, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:06PM EST on January 28, 2010
Many months ago, I asked my readers to send me pictures of people who mattered, who made a difference--people they couldn't live without. The result of that shout out is now published on the inside cover of my new book....
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:57AM EST on January 28, 2010
How can I explain the never-ending irrationality of human behavior? We say we want one thing, then we do another. We say we want to be successful but we sabotage the job interview. We say we want a product to...
Wednesday January 27, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:28AM EST on January 27, 2010
Free is something you get, no matter what. A bonus is something you get as an add-on when you purchase something, or trade your attention. The purpose of free is to spread the word, alert the universe and generate interest....
Tuesday January 26, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:52PM EST on January 26, 2010
There's going to be a lot of hoopla this week, some of it on this very blog (three posts already today!). I want to be the very first author to announce a new project for Apple's tablet. Apple is announcing...
Posted by: Seth Godin at 9:57AM EST on January 26, 2010
[I'll be updating this post all day, just fyi, click through to see the latest update] You know by now that I haven't gone to any traditional media for the launch of my new book - no pitches to newspapers,...
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:05AM EST on January 26, 2010
If you've never written a non-fiction book, there are a lot of reasons why you might want to. It organizes your thoughts. It's a big project worthy of your attention. Noted. But once you've written a book, it's not clear...
Monday January 25, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 6:31AM EST on January 25, 2010
My definition of art contains three elements: Art is made by a human being. Art is created to have an impact, to change someone else. Art is a gift. You can sell the souvenir, the canvas, the recording... but the...
Sunday January 24, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:58AM EST on January 24, 2010
Sure, there are playoffs in football, but competition is everywhere, we just forget to notice it. There are three hundred photographers looking for work in a particular specialty. One puts a creative commons license on his shots in Flickr and...
Saturday January 23, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:12AM EST on January 23, 2010
File this one under basic human emotions that marketers need to be aware of. When a global slowdown, national tragedy or random event hits, people look for someone to blame. If there's no one to blame, sometimes they look for...
Friday January 22, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:59AM EST on January 22, 2010
It's natural to seek reassurance. Most of us want to believe that the choices we make will work out, that everything will be okay. Artists and those that launch the untested, the new and the emotional (and I'd put marketers...
Thursday January 21, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:07AM EST on January 21, 2010
Business plans with too much detail, books with too much proof, politicians with too much granularity... it seems as though more data is a good thing, because data proves the case. In my experience, data crowds out faith. And without...
Wednesday January 20, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 6:16AM EST on January 20, 2010
Scott McCloud's classic book on comics explains a lot more than comics. A key part of his thesis is that comic books work because the action takes place between the frames. Our imagination fills in the gaps between what happened...
Tuesday January 19, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:51AM EST on January 19, 2010
If you write it down, we're going to judge it. Not just the words, we're going to judge you even before we read the words. The typography you use, whether it's a handwritten note or a glossy brochure, sends a...
Monday January 18, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 4:39PM EST on January 18, 2010
Find a calling and then deliver. “If a man is called to be a street sweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted or Beethoven composed music or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all...
Posted by: Seth Godin at 6:00AM EST on January 18, 2010
When I was at MOMA last week, I saw a list of director and artist Tim Burton's projects. Here's the guy who's responsible for some of the most breathtaking movies of his generation, and the real surprise is this: almost...
Sunday January 17, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:31AM EST on January 17, 2010
Most people grow up with one and only one voice in our heads. It's the one that talks when we talk to ourselves. (If you have more than one voice, time to check in with a doctor). It's easy, then,...
Saturday January 16, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 6:42AM EST on January 16, 2010
That's really the only questions between you and a sale. If someone is going to buy from you, is it because you're the cheapest? That's a hard thing to maintain. There better be a more sustainable reason than that. If...
Friday January 15, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:48AM EST on January 15, 2010
It's easy to get trapped wondering what consumers want, and then being frustrated when you can't get what you cook up in front of the people who want to buy it. It's easy to forget what industry wants. Supermarkets don't...
Posted by: Seth Godin at 4:41AM EST on January 15, 2010
Last month, I offered readers who wanted to review my new book a chance to get an early copy. It was a pretty big risk, because it meant ignoring the tried and true process of talking to big media and...
Thursday January 14, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:45AM EST on January 14, 2010
We often talk about speed when describing certain kinds of businesses. Some companies are bureaucratic, slow, dysfunctional... others are fast... fast to market, fast to ship you something. Just like a car, though, there's an alternative to raw speed. Call...
Wednesday January 13, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:22AM EST on January 13, 2010
Here's a common human trick: before you state your complaint, wind yourself up with a preface that makes your complaint even more plaintive and more vivid. "Do you know who I am!" "I saved up for four years for this...
Tuesday January 12, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 6:08AM EST on January 12, 2010
are neither. Of course they don't exist to help you plan or execute a career. Most of the organizations with booths are bottom fishing, looking for enough willing and able employees to fill established gaps in their companies. This is...
Monday January 11, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:10AM EST on January 11, 2010
The first stand is run by two kids. They use Countrytime lemonade, paper cups and a bridge table. It's a decent lemonade stand, one in the long tradition of standard lemonade stands. It costs a dollar to buy a cup,...
Sunday January 10, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 6:24AM EST on January 10, 2010
Type in a few search terms (like Babies and Airplanes) and out pops one of the millions of ads in this incredible database. Certain to inspire, or possibly just give you fodder for a great presentation.
Saturday January 9, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:32AM EST on January 9, 2010
What should libraries do to become relevant in the digital age? They can't survive as community-funded repositories for books that individuals don't want to own (or for reference books we can't afford to own.) More librarians are telling me (unhappily)...
Friday January 8, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:56AM EST on January 8, 2010
Does your job happen to you? If you're a willing cog in the vast machinery of work, it's entirely possible that the things that occur all day feel like they're being done to you. The alternative is to create a...
Thursday January 7, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 4:38PM EST on January 7, 2010
In case you missed it over the holidays. There were a few tickets left, but now they're gone. Sorry. See you there!
Posted by: Seth Godin at 6:02AM EST on January 7, 2010
The secret to creativity is curiosity. We often forget to teach kids to be curious. A student who has no perceived math ability, or illegible handwriting or the inability to sit still for five minutes gets immediate and escalating attention....
Wednesday January 6, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 6:00AM EST on January 6, 2010
Perhaps the most plaintive complaint I hear from organizations goes something like this, "We worked really hard to get very good at xyz. We're well regarded, we're talented and now, all the market cares about is price. How can we...
Tuesday January 5, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:53AM EST on January 5, 2010
They cost too much and they don't work very well. Most people ignore them, they don't last very long and they're undependable. Anil Dash has discovered that having ten times as many Twitter followers generates approximately zero times as much...
Monday January 4, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 4:05PM EST on January 4, 2010
This blog can be easily read every day, for free, on a new app for your iPhone. The nice guys who built it also offer an app that lets you build your own quick RSS apps and more. Save a...
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:21AM EST on January 4, 2010
If so, I'm not seeing it. When something is scarce, it's valuable and smart people try to make more of it. So, should we be trying to make more fear? Looking around, it appears as though the government, various media...
Sunday January 3, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 6:28AM EST on January 3, 2010
One of the most common things I hear is, "I'd like to do something remarkable like that, but my xyz won't let me." Where xyz = my boss, my publisher, my partner, my licensor, my franchisor, etc. Well, you can...
Saturday January 2, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 5:59AM EST on January 2, 2010
Technicians who invented it, run it Technicians with taste, leverage it Artists take over from the technicians MBAs take over from the artists Bureaucrats drive the medium to banality TV used to be driven by the guys who knew how...
Friday January 1, 2010
Posted by: Seth Godin at 6:08AM EST on January 1, 2010
Here are my picks for the two most important trends of the decade we're just starting: Change: The infrastructure of massive connection is now real. People around the world have cell phones. The first internet generation is old enough to...
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