August « 2006 « 800 CEO Read

August 31, 2006

Business Books: Fall 2006 Preview

Filed under: Advertising,Big Ideas,Customer Service,Design,General Business,General Management,Global Business,History and Biographies,Leadership,Lists,New Releases,Personal Development,Strategy — Todd Sattersten @ 10:45 am

I am starting to get asked what the big books for the fall are, so I thought I should get a list up here. As always, there is something for everyone.

September

A Leader’s Legacy by James Kouzes and Barry Posner (Jossey-Bass) – This is a follow-on to the best-seller The Leadership Challenge; alot of people like Kouzes and Posner’s take on leadership.
Hoopla by Crispin Porter + Bogusky (Powerhouse) – Powerhouse has been doing the Lovemarks/Kevin Roberts books and I have been looking forward to seeing what they do with another ad agency.
Success Built to Last: Creating A Life That Matters by Jerry Porras et al. (Wharton School Publishing) – Built to Last author Porras this time asks what people rather than companies need to do to find success.
Bangalore Tiger: How Indian Tech Upstart WIPRO is Rewriting the Rules of Global Competition by Steve Hamm (McGraw-Hill) – The senior writer goes inside this Indian phenom to find out what has brought all the success.

October

Mavericks at Work: Why The Most Original Minds In Business Win by Bill Taylor and Polly LaBarre (William Morrow) – Bill and Polly created business conversation in the 90′s at writing Fast Company magazine. If you have missed that passion and energy, you’ll love the book.
Tough Choices by Carly Fiorina (Portfolio) – This is going to be a big book. The former CEO of Hewlett-Packard tells her rise to the top and what happened when she got there.
L.L. Bean: The Making of an American Icon by Leon Gorman (Harvard Business School Press) – Word has it that HBSP has been bugging the folks at L.L. Bean for years to do a book; it finally here and expect to see lots of cross-promotion in other L.L. Bean communications.
Green to Gold: How Smart Companies Use Environmental Strategy to Innovate, Create Value, and Build Competitive Advantage by Daniel Esty and Andrew Winston (Yale) – This title shows how companies can use green issues as a competitive weapon.
The Starfish and The Spider: The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations by Ori Brafman and Rod Beckstrom (Portfolio) – What do Alcoholics Anonymous, Napster, and al Queda all have in common? No one runs them. I love this book and highly recommend you check it out.
Setting the Table: The Power of Hospitality in Restaurants, Business, and Life by Danny Meyer (HarperCollins) – Meyer knows something about delivering service. His restaurants occupy four of the top twenty spots on Zagat’s.
Tailgating, Sacks, and Salary Caps: How The NFL Became the Most Successful Sports Franchise in History by Mark Yost (Kaplan, Nov.) – This is about the business of football in all its glory.

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800ceoread Presents…

Filed under: General Business,General Management,The Company — Todd Sattersten @ 9:39 am

We are branching out this fall and are hosting two events in Milwaukee. This is not completely new for us. We have worked with other organizations in the past to bring speakers to the city, but the last event we were involved in was probably five years ago.

Our first event is with Bill Taylor. Bill co-founded Fast Company Magazine and is releasing a book in October called Mavericks At Work. If you were a fan of FC in its glory days, you will love the book. The event is going to be on October 12th at 6pm.

Our second event is two weeks later when Carly Fiorina visits Milwaukee. The former CEO of Hewlett-Packard is touring on her new book Tough Choices. This one is going to be a breakfast event at the Midwest Express Center on October 27th.

If you are in within driving distance of Brew City, consider coming to these. If these work out, we are going to bring another slate of business speakers to Milwaukee in 2007.

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August 30, 2006

Caught my eye.

Filed under: Marketing — Kate @ 1:17 pm

A few posts on the art of word of mouth in the last week have caught my eye.

First is Guy Kawasaki’s early review of Andy Sernovitz’s (CEO of the Word of Mouth Marketing Association) book Word of Mouth Marketing due out this November. Guy posted on some of the highlights:

The most powerful word-of-mouth advocates might be the customers who have only done business with you once so far.

First impressions are important. What are you doing to encourage this w-o-m?

Two interesting examples, also from Andy, are:

The Prostate Net, a not-for-profit educational organization, contacted 50,000 barbers to talk to their clients about prostate cancer detection and prevention.

The Wynn Las Vegas resort gave free rooms to cabbies to generate word-of-mouth advertising via this very influential part of the transportation infrastructure.

Wynn and the Prostate Net both gave their possible advocates the tools (some would call experience) to talk about.

. . .
. . .
Next along the same lines…

Why companies should make prettier user manuals. Customers are attracted by pretty brochures and advertisements but what about user manuals? How many times have you actually enjoyed picking up the DVD manual or reading how to build an IKEA item?

How J. Crew remembered Jackie. It’s hard to believe that a chain like J.Crew would remember someone’s favorite sports team. I’m amazed. There’s always more to learn about customers.

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New podcast with John Maxwell

Filed under: Personal Development — Todd Sattersten @ 11:33 am

I just posted a new podcast with John Maxwell. We spend 30 minutes talking about the importance of attitude.

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John Maxwell/The Difference Maker Interview

Filed under: Audio — Todd Sattersten @ 11:21 am

This week’s podcast is with John Maxwell, author of The Difference Maker. I had a chance to talk with John for about 30 minutes about the power of attitude. The subtitle for the book is “Making Your Attitude Your Greatest Asset”. We talk about what attitude is, what attitude can and cannot do for you, and the five things that can negatively impact your attitude.

mp3, 27:21, 18.8MB

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August 29, 2006

Review of The Long Tail by Steve Sherlock

Filed under: Book Reviews — Kate @ 10:13 am

Chris Anderson, editor in chief of Wired magazine, first published the essay that became the blog that is now the book, The Long Tail, in October 2004. The basic premise of the Long Tail was the result of three observations:

the tail of available variety is far longer than we realized
it’s now within reach economically
all those niches, when aggregated, can make up a significant market (1)

His analysis and research into these observations fleshes out the length of the article, through the blog postings (and feedback), to the current book length. Chris builds this proposal carefully. He backs it up with statistics from good sources. The discussion revolves around hits versus niche. The major mass marketing efforts were all to generate hits. Mass media could position the message and deliver it effectively. The internet and technology in general has helped to make the delivery to the niche markets more affordable. The bricks and mortar stores can only stock so many copies of books. An online retailer (like Amazon) can have an unlimited warehouse to provide far more book titles than the corner bookstore.

Chris identifies three forces and then market opportunities for the Long Tail. The first force democratizes the tools of production. Newspapers were the only source of info as they had the press and wherewithal to distribute the papers. Almost anyone can set up a blog to provide news for their community that can rival the nearest local paper. The second force is to cut the costs of consumption by democratizing the distribution. To continue my newspaper example,
the paper was printed and then distributed via truck and carriers to business and households for a delivery price. The local blog can come to your internet doorstep for less. It still costs something as you need access and a system, but overtime the cost for a single newspaper vs. the blog news posting is more.

The third force is to connect the supply and demand for the news. The paper prints what the editorial desk chooses. The blogger focuses on its readership community. Some one outside that community has to go to great expense, if it is possible to obtain the paper. Where the local blog can reach anyone around the world originally via search or word of mouth and subsequently via RSS subscription.

The market opportunities run parallel to the three forces. The first covers the tool makers or producers of the product (content).
The second covers the aggregators (Amazon, eBay, et al). The third covers the filters (Google, blogs, et al). Chris summarizes this point well:

Amplified word of mouth is the mnifestation of the third force of the Long Tail: tapping consumer sentiment to connect supply to demand. The first force, democratizing production, populates the Tail. The second force, democratizing the distribution, makes it all available. But those two are not enough. It is not until the third force, which helps people find what they want in this new superabundance of variety, kicks in that the potential of the Long Tail marketplace is truly unleashed.
(2)

The Long Tail idea that Chris has created provides an outlook for the marketplace going forward. This is the blueprint by which one can succeed. Note that Mass media will not disappear overnight. The Long Tail will work by creating niches around the mass market. Other brick and mortar businesses will continue to succeed but it will depend upon the nature of the product and consumer relationship. For those
products in the information or knowledge space, the Long Tail principles should be followed.

My humble review will not be the end to the conversation. The discussion around the Long Tail will continue. Chris holds an active conversation around points made in the book and in other reviews of the book on his Long Tail blog. If you have not visited the blog or would like to curl up with a good business book, then this is one I would heartily recommend. You won’t go to sleep reading it.

Additional quotes to take away:

When you can dramatically lower the cost of connecting the supply and demand, it changes not just the numbers, but the entire nature of the market. This is not just a quantitative change, but a qualitative one too. Bringing niches within reach reveals latent demand for non-commercial content. Then as demand shifts toward the niches, the economics of providing them improve further, and so on, creating a positive feedback loop that will transform entire industries — and the culture — for decades to come. (3)

Instead of the office watercooler, which crosses cultural boundaries as only the random assortment of personalities found in the workplace can, we’re increasingly forming our own tribes, groups bound together more by affinity and shared interests than by default broadcast schedules. These days our watercoolers are increasingly virtual — there are many different ones, and the people who cather aound them are self selected. We are turning from a mass market back into a niche nation, defined now not by our geography but by our interests. (4)

One of the big differences between the head and the tail of the producers is that the further down you are in the tail, the more likely you are to have to keep your day job. And that’s okay. The distinction between "professional" producers and "amateurs" is blurring and may, in fact, ultimately become irrelevent. We make not just what we’re paid to make, but also what we want to make. And both can have value. (5)

(1) – The Long Tail, page 10

(2) – ibid, page 107

(3) – ibid, page 26

4) – ibid, page 40

(5) – ibid, page 78

Steve Sherlock writes primarily at Steve’s 2 Cents

Technorati Tags: Chris+Anderson, Wired, Long+Tail,
niche, hit, marketplace

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August 25, 2006

Talking Blogging with Debbie Weil

Filed under: Information Technology — Todd Sattersten @ 4:06 pm

Debbie Weil is running a great offer in conjunction with us on her new book The Corporate Blogging Book. She will give you a seat at a free teleconference if you buy 5 or more books of her book from us. Read all the rules and regulations on her blog.

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So we're competitive…

Filed under: Misc. — Kate @ 1:15 pm

A quick BusinessWeek stat for you:

18,038
business books on
Amazon.com mention
“competitiveness”

Wow. We’re a competitive little bunch of consumers.

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Do sequels help the original?

Filed under: Publishing Industry — Todd Sattersten @ 11:46 am

Today you will find How Full Is Your Bucket? on at the #15 spot on the WSJ bestsellers list. What is a book that came out in July 2004 doing back on the list?

My theory: the release of Tom Rath’s second book Vital Friends.

There seems to be phenomenon that a business book author’s first book gets a bump when the second comes out. I can’t show you data (yet), but I have heard this often anecdotally from authors and publishers. I am sure there is also a popularity threshold for the first book has pass, in order for this to be true.

We are working on some research, and might be able to tell you more soon on this.

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August 24, 2006

Learning to teach

Filed under: Training and Development — Kate @ 11:16 am

There are two solutions that will ensure you reach apprentices with differing styles. One solution is to hand this chapter to your apprentice and have a frank discussion about what works and what doesnt for him. It wont take long, and youre bound to learn something from each other. At the very least, youll give your apprentice language that he can use to speak up and give you feedback. The last thing you want is to have him be a victim of your approach to teaching.

–Steve Trautman

Read part of that chapter…

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