Some of the Best Marketing Books of All time: Old and Modern

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If you work in the fast paced and constantly changing world of online marketing, there comes a point where you realize you just can’t keep up with everything. There is always new technology lurking around the corner, growth hacking strategies for every scenario, education to help take your skills to the next level and so much more. It’s just information overload.

Sometimes you just need to sit back, get away from your monitor, grab some coffee and dive deep into a good book. Reading a good book can stimulate you in ways the online world simply can’t. You can take time to fully consume information, dissect it and make sense of it for yourself. 

In this post, we will take a look into some of the best marketing books of all time in our digital age and old marketing books which have stood the test of time. 

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‍Epic Content Marketing - Joe Pullizzi

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Epic Content Marketing is a book that is meant to teach you the process of creating stories which are meant to educate and entertain customers to take action without directly telling them to do so. The book shares 6 main principles that can help you position yourself and your business as an authority online.  They include:

1. Epic content must fill an unmet need, question or add value
2. Epic content is delivery consistently
3. Your content requires a unique, human voice 
4. The content you create must express some sort of opinion and not just facts
5. Avoid sales talk because it can destroy the value of your content
6. Your main goal should be to create the best content for your industry or niche

Who is This Book For ?

This book is great for people who need a structured framework to develop powerful content marketing stories that can help build their brand. If you want to improve your content marketing skills this book is a must read.

Why Read This Book?

Reading this book can help you develop the necessary framework for a successful content marketing strategy in order to grow your business. If you lack the necessary knowledge in creating powerful messages inside your business, this book can help you develop the necessary skills to do so. 

DOTCOM Secrets - Russell Brunson

If you have ever taken any sort of interest in internet marketing or any sort of online marketing, you have most likely heard of Russell Brunson at one point or another. DOTCOM Secrets is perhaps one of the most popular books for modern day online marketers and entrepreneurs. 

People who are struggling online typically believe it's due not getting enough traffic to their website, or even struggling to convert that traffic to sales. Russell believes some of these struggles are part of a much bigger problem which tends to be much harder to see. DOTCOM Secrets will give you the right marketing funnels and sales scripts you need in order to get and convert more leads. 

Who is This Book For ?

This book is meant for entrepreneurs and online marketers who have an interest in improving their marketing and sales. It’s also for people who have an interest in learning how to build successful sales and marketing funnels along with using the necessary sales scripts and lingo to do so.

Why Read This Book?

Reading this book will open your eyes to a whole different world of marketing you may have never considered before. In today’s digital marketing world, sales funnels are an extremely important component to running a successful company and DOTCOM secrets is the bible for sales and marketing funnels. 

The 1- Page Marketing Plan - Allan Dib

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Traditionally, the process of creating a marketing plan has been difficult, expensive and time consuming. Inside The 1-Page Marketing Plan the author and serial entrepreneur Allan Dib shows you the process of creating an effective marketing plan in a single page divided into multiple squares.

Inside this book you will learn:

• The process of acquiring new customers, clients or patience for your business
• Why traditional old school style of marketing can harm or destroy your business
• The right way to close sales without being pushy, needy or desperate
• How to beat your competitors and stand out in your niche
• How to get massive results on a tight budget by using the power of direct responsive marketing
• Negotiating higher prices for your products and services and so much more

Who is This Book For ?

This book is for businesses owners or startups who want to create a simple and effective marketing plan without breaking the bank. It’s also meant for people who are just getting started in business or seasoned entrepreneurs who have a strong desire to improve their overall marketing efforts.

Why Read This Book?

Reading this book can help you discover a more straightforward approach to creating an effective marketing plan. You can also learn an alternative step-by-step process for creating your own personalized marketing plan that fits your business and your business only. 

Buyology - Martin Lindstrom

If you really think about it, how much do you really know about why you buy? Probably not as much as you think. Buyology reveals the shocking truths about what kinds of factors grab our attention and cause us to make purchasing decisions. It’s not at all what you would think.

Some of the most commonly held assumption about buying which Buyology confronts include:

• Sex doesn't sell
• Subliminal advertising is ubiquitous
• Brands can trigger our mating instincts
• Color can be extremely powerful to induce our purchasing decisions
  

The truth is, so much of what we have been taught to believe about buying is simply wrong. Buyology is an extremely interesting book about the mind of today’s consumer and long-held assumptions and myths we have all been taught. 

Who is This Book For ?

This book is meant for people who have a strong interest about the psychology and mindset of consumers. It can open your mind to commonly held beliefs about consumerism and interest in our modern world. 

Why Read This Book?

You should read this book if you have an interest in learning what it really is that causes people to make purchasing decisions. In this book Lindstrom makes some extremely shocking findings from his three-year, seven-million-dollar neuromarketing study of over 2,000 volunteers who get exposed to different ads, logos, brands, commercials, prices, and products. 

Pro tip: See here the video's every Salesperson should watch

Made to Stick - Chip Heath and Dan Heath 

In the book Made to Stick, the two authors, Chip Heath and Dan Heath dive into the reasons why some ideas do extremely well while others simply die off and how you can improve the chances of having good ideas. They reveal the anatomy behind ideas that stick and explain different ways to make ideas stickier and how to actually present them the right way so they resonated with people.

Some of the ways this is presented in the book is by applying the “human scale principle” and using the “Velcro Theory of Memory” and creating “curiosity gaps”. This book can truly transform the way you communicate ideas. 

Who is This Book For ?

This book is great for people who want insight into the right way to present their ideas to others in a non-traditional way. It can help you create your own unique and effective process for creating and presenting ideas that are much more potent which draw people in. If you want to improve your communication skills this is a great book for you.

Why Read This Book?

If you are a sales or marketing professional this book can be great in helping you discover unique ways of selling or getting your pitch across to an audience. The idea of creating curiosity gaps can help you draw people in without extra effort.

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The Anatomy of Buzz - Emanuel Rosen

Inside the Anatomy of Buzz, ex marketing VP Emanuel Rosen breaks down the products and services that benefited the most from natural buzz consumerism which embraces all different markets such as technology and books to entertainment and legal services. The book offers unique strategies for creating, scaling and sustaining the natural word of mouth campaigns.

The book is packed with unique information from different executive interviews, marketing experts and researchers who have built effective marketing campaigns for big brands. Rosen details the ins and outs of attracting the attention of people who are major influencers. He also discusses techniques and strategies for improving customer-to-customer interaction and how companies can quickly spread the word to new territories about their products or services.

Who is This Book For ?

This book is great for entrepreneurs or individuals who want  to learn different strategies for spreading their message about new products or services that they are offering. It’s also great for current business owners who have an interest in learning how to improve the buzz of their existing products or services. 

Why Read This Book?

Reading this book can help you discover unique strategies for improving word of mouth about your business or product. It can shed light on the techniques used by big brands in order to drive interest and sales in their products or services organically. It’s a must read for business owners and inspiring entrepreneurs. 

Contagious: Why Things Catch On

Contagious is a New York Times bestseller which explains the reasons why certain products and concepts catch on in the marketplace. It dives deep into the advertising concepts behind products and services becoming popular. 

One Jonah Berger’s major conclusions from researching what makes things popular is the fact that people listen to their peers. He reveals why certain products spread quickly by word of mouth and how our social influence shapes everything around us. 

Contagious outlines the techniques which cause information to spread, how to create messages that can spread, advertisements and the type of content that people love to share.

‍Who is This Book For ?

‍This book is for people who are interested in learning what kinds of factors make certain products and services more likely to succeed than others. It can be specifically helpful for marketers, researchers and entrepreneurs who want to explore the science behind why some ideas and products succeed and others fail. 

Why Read This Book?

Reading this book can help you improve your marketing strategy and understand effective ways in creating products and helping them grow. It can also help you develop the right strategy and ideas for making your product spread in the marketplace.

This Is Marketing: You Can't Be Seen Until You Learn to See

This is Marketing, by Seth Godin is a great book for aspiring marketers who want to learn how to present your product or service to the world. Seth believes that great marketers don’t need to use consumers to solve their company’s existing problems. Instead they need to use the right kind of marketing tactics in order to solve other people's problems

The tactics discussed in the book rely on empathy, connection and emotional value instead of the standard attention seeking ads you see online. 

In this book you will learn some core concepts such as:

• How to build trust and permission with your target market.
• The art of positioning--deciding not only who it's for, but who it's not for.
• Why the best way to achieve your goals is to help others become who they want to be.
• Why the old approaches to advertising and branding no longer work.  
• The surprising role of tension in any decision to buy (or not).
•  How marketing is at its core about the stories we tell ourselves about our social status.
  

‍Who is This Book For ?

This book is aimed at people who are thinking about launching their own product or service and need the right kind of marketing framework in place in order to better connect with their target audience and future customers. 

Why Read This Book?

You should read this book in order to learn the right ways to connect with your target audience in order to gain their trust so they can purchase your product or service. This book will also teach you the right way to craft a story around your marketing in order to make a better connection with your audience. 

Looking for the best Sales books? See our blog with the 10 best sales books of all time.