March 6, 2006
seth godin at google
Seth Godin gives an amazing talk to Google employees. [Thanks to Rick Segal for the link.]
His big idea to Google: “Your success was down to marketing, not technology.”
Tell all your employees to watch the video. If anybody doesn’t get it, fire them.
For what it’s worth, Seth’s most famous book is “Purple Cow”. Personally, I think his latest book, “All Marketers Are Liars” is his most important.
Seth Godin Speaks at Google
Hugh Mcleod is more extreme: “Tell all your employees to watch the video. If anybody doesn’t get it, fire them.”
Seth Godin Sells More X-Ray Specs
So multiple bloggers (Darren Rowse, for one) are pointing to the video of Seth Godin’s talk at Google. I’ve always been skeptical about Seth’s work, and now I think I understand why.
You see, Seth really doesn’t have anything…
I watched the video and I was gobsmacked that Seth is getting credit for something so damn obvious that I couldn’t figure out why people needed to be told this stuff. And even if they “get it” now, what good will it do them?
Our world is all about stories…we have nothing else.
Tom, if it were so easy, everybody would be doing it… and they’re not.
Wht Seth is VERY good at doing, is making people believe that what he just said they already knew, if if they didn’t.
As I told him, I think the Google talk was the best thing I’ve seen Seth do but i would disagree marginally with your explanation. For me, the key is that it’s amazing how many “smart” people don’t get what many of us see as obvious. That was apparent from the “q and a” session and from the comment above that inferred that the talk was “about” stories.
And for me Permission Marketing all those years ago was the most important book because everything else flows from that.
I think Seth is fundamentally mistaken about why people buy bottled water (except perhaps for Bling). The tap water in most municipalities in the US is undrinkable, reeking of chlorine. It’s hard to even shower in the stuff. There is a growing health consciousness that is behind this market. The great majority of bottled water drinkers have no brand loyalty.
I find that Seth leans very heavily on Tom Peters’ pioneering efforts and rarely has an original thought.