Seth Godin

The old saying is wrong—winners do quit, and quitters do win.Every new project (or job, or hobby, or company) starts out exciting and fun. Then it gets harder and less fun, until it hits a low point—really hard, and not much fun at all.And then you find yourself asking if the goal is even worth the hassle. Maybe you're in a Dip—a temporary setback that will get better if you keep pushing. But maybe it's really a Cul-de-Sac, which will never get better, no matter how hard you try.According to bestselling author Seth Godin, what really sets superstars apart from everyone else is the ability to escape dead ends quickly, while staying focused and motivated when it really counts.Winners quit fast, quit often, and quit without guilt—until they commit to beating the right Dip for the right reasons. In fact, winners seek out the Dip. They realize that the bigger the barrier, the bigger the reward for getting past it. If you can become number one in your niche, you'll get more than your fair share of profits, glory, and long-term security.Losers, on the other hand, fall into two basic traps. Either they fail to stick out the Dip—they get to the moment of truth and then give up—or they never even find the right Dip to conquer.Whether you're a graphic designer, a sales rep, an athlete, or an aspiring CEO, this fun little book will help you figure out if you're in a Dip that's worthy of your time, effort, and talents. If you are, The Dip will inspire you to hang tough. If not, it will help you find the courage to quit—so you can be number one at something else.Seth Godin doesn't claim to have all the answers. But he will teach you how to ask the right questions.

As one of today's most influential business thinkers, Seth Godin helps his army of fans stay focused, stay connected, and stay dissatisfied with the status quo, the ordinary, the boring. His books, blog posts, magazine articles, and speeches have inspired countless entrepreneurs, marketing people, innovators, and managers around the world. Now, for the first time, Godin has collected the most provocative short pieces from his pioneering blog—ranked #70 by Feedster (out of millions published) in worldwide readership. This book also includes his most popular columns from Fast Company magazine, and several of the short e-books he has written in the last few years. A sample: - Bon Jovi And The Pirates - Christmas Card Spam - Clinging To Your Job Title? - How Much Would You Pay to Be on Oprah's Show? - The Persistence of Really Bad Ideas - The Seduction of "Good Enough" - What Happens When It's All on Tape? - Would You Buy Life Insurance at a Rock Concert? Small is the New Big is a huge bowl of inspiration that you can gobble in one sitting or dip into at any time. As Godin writes in his introduction: "I guarantee that you'll find some ideas that don't work for you. But I'm certain that you're smart enough to see the stuff you've always wanted to do, buried deep inside one of these riffs. And I'm betting that once inspired, you'll actually make something happen."

All marketers tell stories. And if they do it right, we believe them. We believe that wine tastes better in a $20 glass than a $1 glass. We believe that an $80,000 Porsche is vastly superior to a $36,000 Volkswagen that's virtually the same car. We believe that $125 sneakers make our feet feel better——and look cooler——than a $25 brand. And believing it makes it true.As Seth Godin showed in this controversial book, great marketers don't talk about features or even benefits. Instead, they tell a story——a story we want to believe, whether it's factual or not. In a world where most people have an infinite number of choices and no time to make them, every organization is a marketer, and all marketing is about telling stories.Marketers succeed when they tell us a story that fits our worldview, a story that we intuitively embrace and then share with our friends. Think of the Dyson vacuum cleaner, or Fiji water or the iPod.But beware: If your stories are inauthentic, you cross the line from fib to fraud. Marketers fail when they are selfish and scurrilous, when they abuse the tools of their trade and make the world worse. That's a lesson learned the hard way by telemarketers, cigarette companies, and sleazy politicians.But for the rest of us, it's time to embrace the power of the story. As Godin writes, "Stories make it easier to understand the world. Stories are the only way we know to spread an idea. Marketers didn't invent storytelling. They just perfected it."

How to find the A"soft innovationA" that will make your product, service, school, church, or career worth talking aboutWe live in an era of too much noise, too much clutter, too many choices, and too much spam. And as Seth GodinA's 200,000-copy bestseller Purple Cow taught the business world, the old ways of marketing simply donA't work anymore. The best way to sell anything these days is through word of mouthA—and the only real way to get word of mouth is to create something remarkable.Free Prize Inside, the sequel to Purple Cow, explains how to do just that. ItA's jammed with practical ideas you can use right now to make your product or service remarkable, so that it will virtually sell itself.Remember when cereal came with a free prize inside? Even if you already liked the cereal, it was the little plastic toy that made it irresistible. Godin explains how you can think of a bonus that will make your customers feel just as excited, no matter what business youA're in. Consider these free prizes:A•?The Tupperware party, which turned buying plastic bowls into a social eventA•?Flintstones vitamins, which turned a serious product into something funA•?The free change-counting machine at every Commerce Bank branchA•?The little blue box from Tiffany, which makes people happy before they even open itThis book offers a way to create free prizes quickly, cheaply, and reliablyA—and persuade others in your organization to help you bring them to life.