[thelist] Online Marketing Resource

[Fred Jones]

> that there is a giant can o' worms. everyone will spend the rest of their
> lives debating how to measure which growth came from the marketing guru and
> which was going to happen anyway.

Thought of that--he is willing to make a second site (unique URL) and
then 100% of sales from that site would be attributed to the marketer.
50% of $10K I would think is not bad. 50% of a year's sales I think
would at least be incentive enough for a marketer to put some effort
into it--the profits would then (in theory) be directly correlated to
his success. Perhaps not, however.

> have your friend read everything ever written by Seth Godin; commit it to
> memory if possible. act on it. it will change how they do business at a
> fundamental organic level, rather than pasting 'marketing' on top of
> whatever he's already doing (see Seth's book "Meatball Sundae")

Hmmm, this is interesting. If it would really change change his
business at a "fundamental organic level" then your vegetable-eating
reference makes sense. Hard to perceive how this works, however, but
it is also interesting that you push his books more than your own
anyhow. :)

> they could read my books too, of course :)

Well now if we read Godin and then Canfield, what about Mike
Michalowicz and Steve Krug and Tim Ash etc. etc. I'm not trying to be
difficult, but it's hard to find one's way around a field that one
doesn't know.

If someone asks me for advice about a CMS, I can provide excellent
professional advice, backed by solid evidence of number of users,
community members, forum activities, and number of large and small
successful sites using the tool etc.. I feel this is all concrete, but
this marketing stuff is all abstract and seems (to me anyhow) mostly
based on anecdotal evidence. Sure maybe Joe's Worm Shop increased
sales by 50% because they read a book, but maybe anyway they would
have--this issue you also noted in your first sentence to me. :)

However, I will also note that Seth Godin does certainly have a very
good reputation. But so do some others.

> Hey, Fred, maybe they have good reputations because they're books indeed WORK.

Hmm, valid point.

Thanks,
Fred