The 16 Best Books About Marketing, Period.

There is a great scene from The Simpsons where Homer is reading a book titled Advanced Marketing.
Then it shows that book in the trash and Homer is reading Beginning Marketing. Then thats in the
trash and Homer picks up a dictionary and looks up the word marketing.
It cuts to him waving a shotgun in front of the bowling alley hes promoting, shouting Come get your
bowling.
Its a decent question. What is marketing? How exactly are you supposed to learn how to do it? In the
course of research my book on growth hacking, I came up with a pretty simple definition: Anything
that gets or keeps customers is marketing. Thats it.
So when when I get asked What are the best books to read about marketing? my list is somewhat
unusual. Because I dont really think marketing is a thing and often times the people writing about or
working in marketing know the absolute least about getting and keeping customers. They know how to
look like Don Draper and thats about it.
And before the pretentious literary people say something about those people who read books about
marketing, Ill say that there is absolutely no shame in reading and learning how to grow your brand or
business. The world would be a better place if artists, entrepreneurs, executives and creative types got
better at explaining and selling what they do. More great stuff would break through in this attention
economy we live in.
Below is a list (not in any particular order) of what I think are the best marketing books to help you do
that. Theyre books that have shaped my career, taught me to land many huge clients, spread messages,
and ultimately helped acquire and keep many customers who spent many millions of dollars. I hope
you like them too.

1. Purple Cow by Seth Godin

You wouldnt tell anyone that you saw a cow. You would tell them if you saw a purple cow. Seth wrote
this book many years ago but its a classic because it says something basic, timeless and important.
Make remarkable things, do remarkable marketing. Its the best way to grow. Its the best way to sell.
Even Jay-Z has recommended this bookto Oprah no less! As a marketer, the clearest takeaway from
the book is: Represent people who stand out, it makes it easier to do what you do.

2 & 3.Confessions of an Advertising Man & The Unpublished Ogilvy by David

Ogilvy
Not only is Ogilvy is a master at advertising and copybut hes a great writer and you could almost say

business philosopher. Confessions is a bit overstated as a title

because Ogilvy doesnt exactly confess to anything. He just shares his
wisdom. Surprisingly, most of the best lessons in this book are not
about advertising but about leadership, client management and
presentation. In my opinion, out of print business books are actually
some of the best books you can read. You can easily parse out the
timeless from the temporal, for starters. More importantly, the
further you go back the less likely the author was to be attempting to
position themselves as a guru or for a line of lucrative speaking gigs.
They were writing a book because they had something to say. This
book is the perfect example of that.

4. Contagious: How to Build Word of Mouth in the

Digital Age by Jonah Berger
I am a big Jonah Berger fan. In terms of business books, this is one
you can trust because he is legit. I based more than a little of Trust
Me Im Lying on the research he has done on what does and doesnt
spread, which I read early when they were published as academic
papers. The book is more accessible than those pages and unless
youre already a high level marketer, this book has real practical
lessons youll want to learn. Some critics of the book have pointed out
that it doesnt tell how some recent things went viral like Gangham
Style or Harlem Shake. Wellwelcome to book publishing. The book
was wrapped before those things happenedbut as a mark of its
value, it correctly predicts how and why they would have. Consider
this your requisite business/marketing book for the year.

5. The Brass Check by Upton Sinclair

You probably dont know this, but in 1920 Upton Sinclair self-published arguably the first ever
structural expose of how the media industry works. Not only did he self-publish itat the height of his
fame no lessbut he refused to copyright it, hoping to pass through the complete media blacklist a
book like this faced. Sinclair deeply understood the economic incentives of early 20th century
journalism and thus could predict and analyze the manipulative effect it had on The Truth. Today,
those incentives and pressures are different but they warp our information in a similar way. In almost
every substantial charge he leveled against the yellow press, you could, today, sub in blogs and the
cable news cycle and be even more correct. Thats why you need to read this book.

6. Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products by Nir Eyal and Ryan

Hoover

This book picks up where Growth Hacker Marketing leaves off. Its
very tactical and has a lot of specific case studies from all sorts of tech
companies. If youre building or growing a startup, I suggest reading
this. It will help you bake marketing (or hooks) into your product
which is what the best marketing does. Originally the book was selfpublished but became such a cult resource inside the tech companies
that it was picked up by Penguin. Ryan Hoover, the co-writer, went
on to found ProductHunt.com which has recently blown up using a
lot of the principles in the book.

7. 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene / 33

Strategies of War by Robert Greene
Of course, I am biased because I trained under Robert. But if I had
not, these books still would have given me a priceless education (as they have for millions of other
people) in how to acquire and build influence. Robert is a crack researcher and storyteller he has a
profound ability to explain timeless truths through story and example. I promise you will leave not just
with actionable lessons but an indelible sense of what to do to make your work seen, respected, and
authoritative. It might seem weird that books about power and war could do thisbut they are
campaigns like any other. Robert explains how the historical greats have found patrons, captivated the
public, commanded fear or deference and ultimately succeeded at what they set out to do. Related to
these books is another favorite of mine: Rules for Radicals by Saul Alinsky. Its great for anyone
marketing a cause or building a movement. Alinsky was also a die hard pragmatist, a man who had
ideals but also a sense for working with and through the system to get what he needed. In fact, his best
examples in the book is actually how to use the system against itself to get what he needed.

8. 22 Immutable Laws: Violate Them at Your Own

Risk! by Al Ries and Jack Trout
Its a short quick read and but I think youll come away with one or
two key lessons that with stick with you. Personally, I found the
valuable lessons were a bit front loaded (the first couple laws are the
best). In short: turns out the best marketing decisions youll make
come long before the paint is dried (or even applied) to the product.
Forget the notion that marketing is something that is applied after
the product is completed and aim to achieve Product-Market Fit. As I
write in Growth Hacker Marketing, the single worst marketing
decision you can make is to work on a product that nobody wants.
Two quick notes: I have heard better things about the old version of
this book so consider that before getting the updated one. It also seems to me that the dumb subtitle

on this book violates a couple of the laws.

9. Permission Marketing: Turning Strangers into Friends and Friends into

Customers by Seth Godin
If you dont know how to build permission assets and you dont encourage your clients to build them
(or build them for yourself) you are bad at what you do. Its that simple. If marketing isnt building a
list, directly or indirectly, its a waste. This book changed and influenced my thinking a lot over the
years. Its what motivated me to build my own reading list email six or seven years ago which now has
some 30,000 subscribers, and has become one of the most valuable assets in my career as a writer.
Start building yours today.

10. Words That Work: Its Not What You Say, Its
What People Hear by Frank Luntz
Frank Luntz is an expert in influencing and leading public perception through image and words. It
actually matters whether were talking about illegal immigrants or undocumented workers, or whether
we describe the problem as climate change or global warming. A lot of people hate this guy but that
doesnt mean he isnt very smart and very good at what he does. Marketers need to understand the
power of language and framingit doesnt matter how right you are, if you lose this battle it can be
impossible to rally people to your cause. A related (and more political book on framing) is Dont Think
of an Elephant. Read them both.

11. Unlabel: Selling You Without Selling Out by Marc Ecko

One of the best business memoirs and books on branding I have ever read. Id recommend it if I hadnt
worked on it or consider Marc my friend. Marc left pharmacy school and hustled to build from scratch
Marc Ecko Entreprises, what is now a billion-dollar empire and later founded Complex Media, which
now boasts over 90 million unique views per month. Marc knows how to create compelling spectacles
(tagging Air Force one), knows how to use celebrity, knows how to design products people like and is
an expert on what they call convergence culture. This is an underrated bookbut only because its
relatively new and not enough people have discovered it.

12. Blue Ocean Strategy: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make
Competition Irrelevant by W. Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne
The best law in the 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing is invent your own category. Well, Blue Ocean
Strategy is entirely about that. Its about competing where there is the least amount of competition. It
teaches you how successful businesses focus on being different, about carving out a new space for
themselves. This book will help with marketing and every other part of business life.

13. Gonzo Marketing: Winning Through Worst Practices by Christopher

Locke
Marketing, according to Noah Kagan, has always been about the
same thing who your customers are and where they are.
Traditional marketers have limited this understanding to shallow
demographic and geographic data. Christopher Locke urges you to
stop treating your customers as abstract data. Instead, you should
start fostering genuine relationships by tapping into your peoples
online communities. Written years before social media, the book is
still one of the best guides on how to engage with your audience
online. As Ive said before, the most effective tool in marketing is
relationships.

14 & 15. All The Kings Men by Robert Penn Warren /

The Harder They Fall by Budd Schulberg
Fiction can teach you about marketing too. These are two classic
American novels, each with a disillusioned PR/marketing man as its
protagonist. One is a media fixer for a fictionalized Huey Long, the
other for a crooked boxer. They are full of all sorts of self-loathing
and introspection. My favorite line from Fall is the one about
thinking we can deal in filth and not become the thing we touch.

16. SPIN : How to Turn the Power of the Press to

Your Advantage by Michael Sitrick
I dont know if this book is still in print but it has some great insight
into the art of media narratives and press management. Sitrick is a major crisis management/publicist
(his co-writer Allan Mayer is the co-chairman of the board of American Apparelwhich is how I found
the book) and he explains how you turn a bad reputation into a good one, as well as how people
squander good reputations through spin. I think you can read this book and be as qualified as the
average media consultant.

I wanted to end this column with a few other recommendations. The books I mentioned above are
excellent, but obviously not conclusive. There are all sorts of great insights that never became books
that will shape you as a marketing. Kevin Kellys 1,000 True Fans piece, for example, is absolutely
critical. Andrew Chens piece on growth hackers as the new VPs of marketing will open your eyes. Tim
Ferrisss blog is one of the best resources for marketing advice: how to create a trailer that spreads, the
lessons learned marketing his bestselling The 4-Hour Body and how to launch a product on Kickstarter
are a must read. Two pieces of mine that I strongly recommend are How to Market a Boring Business

and The Right (and Wrong) Way to Market A Book. I urge you to read James Altuchers piece on selfpublishing, where a lot of the principles discussed come into play: building permission assets, building
relationships, thinking early on about marketing, etc. To understand how to get media coverage, read
How To Get Press for Anything and supplement with Why Most Startups Dont Get Press.
And finally, you can check out Growth Hacker Marketing: A Primer on the Future of PR, Marketing &
Advertising, which is now out in paperback. It was heavily influenced by the books and articles

mentioned above.