It's the time of year when we reflect back on the past twelve months and prepare for the upcoming twelve. Hopefully between the joy and the jobs of the holiday season, you can find a little time to focus on some information regarding the marketing of your business. We’ll give you a few content suggestions here – some recent, some classics, some traditional media, and some new media.
We’ll start with three fairly recent digital marketing books that have 5-star ratings on Amazon. First up is Top Of Mind: Use Content To Unleash Your Influence and Engage Those Who Matter To You. John Hall is the founder of Influence & Co. He writes in an engaging style on the utterly relevant branding question of modern times: How do you keep your business in the forefront of your various audiences’ minds?They Ask You Answer: A Revolutionary Approach to Inbound Sales, Content Marketing, and Today’s Digital Consumer. In this book, Marcus Sheridan recounts his discovery after the 2008 financial crisis of strong internet marketing that led him to becoming the leading pool installer in the US. His method? Answering the questions his potential clients pose and seeking high-level content that he employs in a systematic and consistently executed strategy.The third digital marketing stocking-stuffer we suggest is Lost and Founder: A Painfully Honest Field Guide to the Startup World. Moz founder Rand Fishkin opens up here about his journey as an owner of a tech startup – the good, the bad, the ugly, and the lessons of each. Fishkin is an SEO expert and his observations will inform the digital marketing strategies of any type of company at any stage of their development.
Before we leave the book section, we’ll put another gift under your tree: a link to the 50 Greatest Marketing Books of All Time (according to BestMarketingDegrees.org). Highlights include #42 ‘Hey Whipple! Squeeze This: The Classic Guide to Creating Great Ads ’ by Luke Sullivan (included here because of its title reference to one of the all-time effective TV campaigns from yester-year); the still relevant Eating the Big Fish: How Challenger Brands Can Compete Against Brand Leaders from 2009; and the top-ranked classic Positioning: The Battle For Your Mind by legendary advertising pioneers Al Ries and Jack Trout.
Next, a pair of blogs with a focus on the video form – but each touches upon many associated topics of multimedia, too. The Unruly Blog gives fantastic insight on that constantly ascending marketing juggernaut known as the short video. There is a lot of excellent info on the sv form and developing positive synergy between social media and video. Distilled has an engaging blog that drills down on video but provides deep knowledge on many marketing tributaries, also: mobile, SEO, analytics, brand strategy and more.Our final holiday treat we present you is one of our Steven James’ favorite voices in the marketing world: Jay Baer. Jay and Convince & Covert consistently deliver relevant and up-to-the-moment marketing information, data, and – in a nutshell – wisdom. Jay is a legend and his passion and generosity come through in all the many media forms he utilizes to assist those who work in the fascinating and enigmatic marketing industry, or the entrepreneurs trying to figure their own way. Check out Jay here in a video clip speaking at a Minneapolis conference and opening up about his past, present, and the future of marketing.At Steven James, we also have a passion to support businesses, agencies, and individuals trying to reach their potential. If you do choose to partner with us, you will find a team that considers our opportunity to help tell your story an honor and a privilege. We wish you all a joyous holiday season!
