Seth Godin interviewed

As a quick followup to the previous post, Seth Godin is interviewed by Thomas White on Business Matters radio show. Worth listening.

New Writing and Publsihing Models - Comment on Godin

Seth Godin recently posted a comment about the need for publishing models that allow writers to benefit from their writing. With digital publising eleminating the historical barriers of printing and publishing content, anyone today can publish their thoughts and writing. (Heck, look at this blog post itself.) For the serious "professional" writer, it now becomes more challenging to stand out from the mass of citizen writers, and even more difficult to earn a living writing in the tradtional manner. Godin posits that new publishing models will evolve to allow writers to be compensated. I suggest that new writing formats may be the solution rather than new publsiing models. Perhaps a combination of both.

For those in marketing, what are the implications? Fewer copy writers? Ability to write your own copy? More or less ways to interact and communicate your brand mesage?

Value of Education - Seth Godin asks

Seth Godin asks "What is school for?" and offers 27 wide-ranging answers. It's an interesting question because it questions the role of educatio in society. For marketers, the question might be addressed from the perspective of defining the benefit being sold by educators. Is the return on educational investment measured in the overall productivity level of the population of a society? Do better educational systems generate greater GNP? Is this the beter metric, or would it be better to compare relative IQs or MENSA qualifications across societies? Jim Collins, author of Good to Great, has written about the application of his approach to evaluating differentiators of great businesses to the non-profit sector, with interesting insights about how the core 'flywheel' model shifts in non-profits.

My suggestion for #28 on Seth Godin's list is: #28. Learn to think critically. As a parent investing in the college education of a child who has chosen to major in Classics (not the major with the highest level of "I got a great job upon graduation" results), I firmly believe he's becoming a better human being able to think critically about the world around him. I suppose this also implies that I believe that better thinking among people will ultimately lead to a better society.

Richard Branson interviewed by Seth Godin

For the small business person aspiring to grow, it is inspirational to see Richard Branson on Open Forum speak about checking the bills monthly when his business was still small. Note that the interviewer here is none other than marketing guru Seth Godin. Any business seeking to validate return on marketing investment needs to understand how the money is being spent. In larger marketing organizations brand managers don't always see the actual invoices. It's a good practice to be sure marketers see the invoices if they are to held accountable.