Glass Tower, Christchurch, New Zealand - PR, Marketing, Media Training

The Cult of the Amateur - Andrew Keen

How Today's Internet is Killing Our Culture and Assaulting Our Economy - that's the subtitle of the book and gives you a good idea of what it's about. Larry Sanger, who co-founded Wikipedia, called it "thought-provoking" while the CEO of Newseek Online is quoted about "the greatest paradigm shift in information and communications history". Besides which, it's well written, which so many of these titles aren't.

Selling the Invisible - Harry Beckwith

It's a 1997 book with big type, a couple of hundred words under each heading ... and one of the the best books on marketing ever. It's the sort that you keep going back to and nodding at the commonsense and re-iteration of what makes for good marketing.

The Extreme Future - James Canton, Ph.D.

So this isn't so much a marketing and communications book as it is a bit of calculated crystal ball gazing about what's going on now and what that might lead to and the repercussions those things could have on our lives in the future. It looks at the next twenty years and talks about medicine, technology, talents wars and the respective predicted futures of America and China. Not so much your light bedtime reading but it'll get your brain going.

Blog marketing - Jeremy Wright

This is worth a re-read (it's three years old now) because it still gets so much of it right, but it's also interesting to see just how far we've come and what's moved on the digital landscape.

The Day The Pigs Refused To Be Driven To Market - Robin Wright

Another oldie but goodie. It just goes to show that the basic principles don't really change while the means of communicating will and do. It's important to go back to the essence of what you're selling and why. Of course the title references George Orwell but from a 1972 perspective, which is fascinating in itself - without the other excellence dissection of marketing and advertising by this highly awarded Creative Director.

.... and more ...

Library

Richard E. Grant – The Wah-Wah Diaries

If you’ve ever been involved in making commercials or films, you know what he’s going through. Richard E. Grant is one of those actors you see in an amazing range of films, but he’s also a superb writer and director. This is his personal story of making a film, with a bit of namedropping and bitchiness for good measure. If you like it read ‘With Nails’ his autobiography.

We-Think by Charles Leadbeater

Let’s talk mass collaboration, not mass production. The Wiki in all of us comes out in this analysis of being 'you are what you share'. Interestingly enough, this book started as an online collaboration, proving that sometimes you are what you preach.

Robert Suttons’s - The No Asshole Rule

O.K. It’s sort of a business book, but it makes some valid points. And with a title like that, well!

How Starbucks Saved My Life by Michael Gates Gill

So he had a great job at an ad agency, got downsized, got sick, got desperate and changed his life at Starbucks. After 25 years as Creative Director at JWT Michael Gates Gill is apparently now (still) a happy barista. Was that to have here or take away?

Buy•ology from Martin Lindstrom

A great read about what makes consumers tick. Is there a gap between why we buy and why we think we buy? This book brings out the science, talking about things like brain scanning to see what influences people. It’s fascinating. It’ll make you sound really interesting and smart at dinner parties.

Seth Godin’s Meatball Sundae

‘Permission Marketing’ was a helluva book, still is. Seth Godin is really interesting. Read it and check out his blog. This is about bottom up, new marketing.

Groundswell by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff

Seth Godin likes this book about the new industrial revolution and how technologies and social media are changing the marketing landscape. Wow. Sounds heavy, but it isn’t. Well, it’s not a woman’s magazine either, so it’s kinda heavy. But very thought-provoking, and thought is good.

Biggest problem, time to read them all.