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Seth Godin's Blog
Bestselling author, Entrepreneur and Agent of change. Seth's blog can be found at http://sethgodin.typepad.com/
November 2007
Friday November 30, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 7:28AM EST on November 30, 2007
Ben has a post about a beer made by an order of monks in Belgium. These monks, who have taken vows of silence, only sell the beer by appointment, don't label the bottles, and severely limit the supply they create....
Thursday November 29, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 3:17PM EST on November 29, 2007
So, as a percentage of the time you spend at work, what percent would you say qualifies as "marketing"? I'm going to count educating yourself, networking, creating products, creating media, spending money, building networks of sneezers, inventing great stuff, executing...
Wednesday November 28, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 11:01AM EST on November 28, 2007
I walked past a private dinner being given at a restaurant in New York last night. Perhaps forty people, listening to an after-dinner speaker. The room was dead. People were sprawled over the chairs. One guy had his head down....
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 10:46AM EST on November 28, 2007
A few unrelated ideas: Brett at Google dropped me a line to let me know that CyberMonday (the Black Monday of online selling) is actually NOT the biggest shopping day of the online year. That comes in 10 days or...
Tuesday November 27, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 8:14AM EST on November 27, 2007
Cory has a post that points out research demonstrating that police have better luck finding suspects using caricatures than boring sketches. A caricature falsely highlights various anomalies while diminishing the boring parts. So Jay Leno gets a ridiculous chin, or...
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 7:35AM EST on November 27, 2007
Just finished buying some checks online. Got to the page with the ridiculous charges for shipping and handling. They were: Slow...$14 (Expected delivery, December 15th) Fast...$18 (Expected delivery, December 10th) Expedited...$18 (Expected delivery, December 5th) "Wow!" I said to myself,...
Monday November 26, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 6:00AM EST on November 26, 2007
Black Monday was 'invented' by my former colleague Jerry Shereshewsky in 1997. His idea was that since people did so much shopping at work, the real shopping day for Christmas was today. The important takeaway for most marketers is this:...
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 5:52AM EST on November 26, 2007
A lot of useful insight (and a great example in itself of how to acquire traffic!) right here from Aaron.
Sunday November 25, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 1:27PM EST on November 25, 2007
After you've spent a career saying things just to make people go away, I wonder if you lose track of the texture of what you're saying. They're tearing down a classic diner in New Rochelle, NY and putting up a...
Saturday November 24, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 8:45AM EST on November 24, 2007
Twenty years ago, the Cowboy Junkies released close to a perfect breakthrough album. It sold a bazillion copies. Every since, they've been touring, making a living on the road as they've released almost twenty records, none of them monster hits...
Thursday November 22, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 9:25PM EST on November 22, 2007
Tomorrow is the ridiculous Black Friday ritual, gaining in steam every year, in which large American retailers run big sales that start at 6 am. People line up even earlier to get in first. Kids are stampeded. Muscles are pulled....
Wednesday November 21, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 12:51PM EST on November 21, 2007
The other day, someone pointed out to me that my blog is read by more people than 95% of all the magazines published in the US. She wanted to know why I don't try to monetize it. "Run ads," she...
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 6:50AM EST on November 21, 2007
(some of which are made to be broken). Tim points us to a terrific summary of lessons learned from eye tracking studies. The highlights, in alphabetical order: Ads in the top and left portions of a page will receive the...
Tuesday November 20, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 5:16PM EST on November 20, 2007
Okay, it's a simple idea: If you're a real estate broker, you work in an industry where everyone used to charge the same fee: 6%. Now, though, discount brokers are turning up the heat on fees. Lots of brokers are...
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 8:55AM EST on November 20, 2007
...though it might feel that way as we move pell mell toward a direct marketing, measured world. This ad from Woot shows up if you do a Google search on the stock symbol for Google (goog). As more and more...
Monday November 19, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 5:39PM EST on November 19, 2007
Rich people used to all be the same, just different from the rest of us. Now they're not only different from the rest of us, but different from each other. Rich people used to do similar jobs, wear similar clothes,...
Sunday November 18, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 8:36PM EST on November 18, 2007
Newsweek has all the details right here. I've been hyperventilating about Amazon becoming a book publisher since at least 1998. That's the juicy part of the business... finding writers for your readers as much as you spend time finding readers...
Saturday November 17, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 9:31PM EST on November 17, 2007
The restaurant in town closed about six months ago. For weeks, there was a sign about renovations. Then a new sign, this one promising big things. Then, of course, the "for rent" sign from the broker. A software service I...
Friday November 16, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 9:07AM EST on November 16, 2007
For as long as I can remember, marketers have been using misogyny to sell products, get votes and attract viewers. It's sort of astonishing... in my lifetime, we've seen the end of public (but certainly not private) attacks on people...
Thursday November 15, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 5:46PM EST on November 15, 2007
Yasmina at Acumen needs help, and it just might be the most important job you ever do. Acumen Fund is hiring for a new associate who can work with them on community building, new media, and communications... this individual would...
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 7:59AM EST on November 15, 2007
In case you had any doubt that human beings are irrational creatures, driven by stories, consider the case of the gift card. Christmas has become a holiday about shopping, not about giving. Case in point: the $100 gift card, now...
Wednesday November 14, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 6:35AM EST on November 14, 2007
Marketing spends a lot of time concealing things. Take this box of Whole Wheat Ritz crackers. The #1 ingredient? White flour. Or consider the fine print read in a hurry at the end of the car ad or the fact...
Tuesday November 13, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 7:27AM EST on November 13, 2007
In just about every business, the last mile accounts for the bulk of the cost of the service or good being sold. Retailers get half. Insurance people get commissions. Distributors make their share. When the internet drove the cost of...
Monday November 12, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 12:51PM EST on November 12, 2007
[Somehow, this post disappeared. I'm trying again!] (Almost) everyone wants choice Choice makes some people stressed and unhappy. But it also makes lots of people happy. And now people have the choice By itself, a bias for choice is interesting...
Sunday November 11, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 2:49PM EST on November 11, 2007
According to a Times interview with the head of Tempurpedic, you don't know. That's how they built a built a billion dollar company. By getting 2% of a market that doesn't care about brands to care about them. A typical...
Saturday November 10, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 10:58AM EST on November 10, 2007
I think it's time you put up a blog for internal use. Use a password if you like. Use it as an internal diary, a way of tracking each day so that a month or a year from now, you...
Friday November 9, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 11:09AM EST on November 9, 2007
Here's a quick way for the mainstream media to enrage people: In a New York Times review of Ron Paul's latest TV commercial, Julie Bosman concludes, "The advertisement accomplishes what the Paul campaign said was its modest goal: to introduce...
Thursday November 8, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 8:40PM EST on November 8, 2007
I've been playing with this idea for about eight months and it's just about ready. I'm really pleased at the finished product. I've never offered a video or a training product, despite the fact that I get asked about it...
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 6:31PM EST on November 8, 2007
Jonathan points us to FreeRice. Sites like this rarely have a valid business model, but it doesn't make them less fun. I was amazed at how well I did. If you're a web developer, notice how interaction leads to involvement...
Wednesday November 7, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 9:34PM EST on November 7, 2007
Three things you need: 1) the ability to abandon a plan when it doesn't work, 2) the confidence to do the right thing even when it costs you money in the short run, and 3) enough belief in other people...
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 11:37AM EST on November 7, 2007
I was at a gala a few weeks ago (featuring no less than ten speakers). At least 80% of them began their talk by saying, "I know you're hungry, but..." or "I know it's late, but..." or "I know you...
Tuesday November 6, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 2:12PM EST on November 6, 2007
Real old-timers remember Hotmail. They came out of nowhere to become a massive ideavirus. growing exponentially and then selling to Microsoft for more than $400 million (in cash). And yet Microsoft has never ever come close to making a profit...
Monday November 5, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 3:03PM EST on November 5, 2007
Michael got a note from Dell today, shortly after buying a computer at work. It starts: Thanks for doing business with Dell! As a gesture of our appreciation, you're receiving a subscription to the weekly Dell Small Business E-mail Update....
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 6:54AM EST on November 5, 2007
Winning In A World Transformed By Social Technologies0 points In the new transparent age, it's really difficult to tell two stories simultaneously. Why George Allen won’t be running for president: It was a great Web moment. George Allen was the...
Sunday November 4, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 2:12PM EST on November 4, 2007
This year, the presidential candidates in the are going to spend a fortune (or perhaps two or three fortunes) marketing themselves in the primaries. Any product or service that is being launched has to deal with its own 'primary.' Here...
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 1:42AM EST on November 4, 2007
Here's why.
Saturday November 3, 2007
Permalink Posted by: Gregory Ferrell at 7:39AM EST on November 3, 2007
You didn't realize it, but just about everything you do online is asynchronous. Craigslist ads run on Thursday and you see them on Friday and get the job on Monday. Email gets sent at 2 and you read it at...