Permission Marketing: Turning Strangers Into Friends And Friends Into Customers (Hardcover)

The book is rife with such statements as: Cadillac buyers being "a tough to reach audience." Ever consider automobile registration data bases? The names and addresses can be had for pennies each. What's "tough to reach" about pennies?

Seth Godin proposes "interruption" marketing is destined for failure. It probably is. He says it doesn't work anymore and that's why American car-makers can't sell cars. Uh. I thought they were selling a lot of them. He says their interruption advertising doesn't work. Americans buy more American-made cars per capita than any nation buys any car per capita. The audience is hooked on new cars. That's a failure?

I am tempted to go on and on with more than one hundred examples of conclusions that are not supported by the facts. I won't. Just one more.

Seth says Internet banners don't work. Okay, I agree. How did Seth build his company, Yoyodyne?

"1. Attract target customers with banner ads promising a great prize. Interested consumers get more information by clicking on the banner, which takes them to a registration page."

And that paragraph (about interruption advertising) is in the chapter on case studies showing how permission marketing works!

The funny thing is that permission marketing works. It's an old concept, been with us for thousands of years. This book presents nothing new, nothing informative, certainly nothing to take back to the office. There is no meat to this sizzle.

Permission Marketing got my permission through my purchase of the book. Seth Godin then abused me for three hours. It's the last time he'll get my permission.

It should be sufficient to say, if you can read, don't bother to read this book.

This book, in it's first few pages, helped me. NO I don't know the author :)

David Saunders, Concord, CA

Mr. Godin hits the bull's-eye on the type of marketing that it takes to acquire and keep customers in your business. It is not mass marketing to anyone and everyone that's going to do it. But rather, Mr. Godin shows you how to set up a specific strategy, a clever method in which to acquire the type of customer you want to your particular business. If you own a sports shop, then your ideal customer wouldn't be a chef or a construction worker who just happened to walk into your store...it would be the die-hard, sports enthusiast that you want to attract. Mr. Godin shows you how to attract your "ideal" customer; He teaches you how to get your ideal customer to come to you.

I didn't fully understand all that "Permission Marketing" was really about until Mr. Godin broke it down and explained it to a tee. If you can get a potential customer to say "yes" to you prior to the sale, your chances of acquiring them as an actual customer dramatically increases. This is what Mr. Godin shows you how to do. He is a wise marketer and you can be too! HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.