Building a Story Brand. Clarify your message so customers will listen. Donald Miller. 2017. ISBN 978071803333. To quote the author, ” If you confuse you lose”. This is the ultimate book on using stories to build your business. One of my clients pointed this book out to me and I am so glad they did. I read it in one sitting but I know I will go back to it many times. Many of the problems I find in my coaching clients have to do with the basic weakness and lack of clarity in their stories they take to prospects. Miller covers this topic very thoroughly – in all facets of your business including internally. Well worth the read and should be on your desk for years.

The LinkedIn Playbook. Contacts to customers. Adam Houlahan. 2022. ISBN 978064535380.   This is a revision to his 2016 book.  It’s good. Very good in fact. The author takes you from the why to the how and is thorough and detailed. I considered myself quite current on LinkedIn but found several tips and ideas that I could use right away. As the LinkedIn audience becomes more sophisticated, we need to always be putting our best foot forward to make good use of this resource and our time.  A quick read as he has a very easy style and helps you make sense of things.

Marketing with Webinars. Get new clients in 1-hour per month. Tom Poland. 2020. ISBN 9780977503261.  Sub subhead. Efficient & effective alternative to seminars, conferences, & tradeshows.  At first, this book ( which is available plus resources at www.marketingwithwebinars.com) struck me as a bit over the top with sales hyperbola. But the author quickly drops into why does but with lots of details to do this.  His detailed marketing system is useful for many efforts needed today.  I quickly found this book to be very enjoyable and useful. In today’s non-contact world this is a good handbook on what to do.   A good read for any tech entrepreneur and market/sales department.

the age of influence. The power of influencers to elevate your brand. Neal Schaffer. 2020. ISBN  9781400216376.   I have read all of Neal’s books in the past  and enjoyed them.  I heard good things about this one, contacted Neal and he sent me a review copy.   He then followed up and asked how it was going.  Neal practises what he talks about in this book. The book is a clear blueprint for working with influencers, with great examples, guides and room for you to maneuver in applying this to your business.  I took pages of notes and checked into most of the web pages/apps he suggested.  The examples are key to understanding how to use this book,  but his thoroughness in describing strategy and execution will make this a read and reread guide to how to do this.  He even h=gives you a web address where he will keep updating this book, important in such a fast-changing market.  It is an easy read, but that does not mean you can treat it lightly.  I highly recommend this book

Sales Differentiation. 19 powerful strategies to win more deals at the prices you want. Lee B. Salz.  2018.  ISBN 9780814439913.  This book delivers what it says and more. The core of differentiation is talking about value as the customer sees it. There are no wasted words in this book, it is current, concise and hits the topic hard.  Any salesperson and sales manager will get much out of the time spent reading and rereading this book. Its totally enjoyable – I could not put it down.  Might just be the best sales book of the year, IMHO

Crossing the Chasm. 3rd edition. Geoffrey Moore.   2014. ISBN 9780062292988.  We read the first edition (1991) when it came out and found it bang on and helpful.  It was time to reread it and the 3rd Edition reflects the work  Moore has done  ( and written about) with high tech companies in the last 25 years.  I was particularly interested in the subtle insights he gives wrto sales and marketing  jobs and personnel while moving along his time line. This reflects what we have learned about the types of people you need during the transition from Innovators/Visionaries ( Chasm)  through to mid majority ( The Tornado).  It is very useful for HR as well.  If you have not read it – and are in any way in a high tech company – do so immediately. If its been awhile since you read it – its well worth the reread. It remains a concise book to company success and although an easy read , it is full of deep insights.

Pocket Mentor. The entrepreneurs’s guide to building a lasting business from scratch. Mark Nureddine 2018.  ISBN 9781943386307.  A very pragmatic, straight forward approach to mentoring that would work with many entrepreneurs.  The case studies and examples are real world. His language is concise and easy to understand.  His products were tangible and hands on so the examples her may need to be finessed for technology plays.  I appreciate the author’s can do attitude to pretty well everything. His advice to entrepreneurs is plain enough that no one would misunderstand how hard it will be to start and run a successful business. Quite a useful summary of pricing here as well.

Account-Based Marketing for dummies. Sangram Vajre. 2016. ISBN 9781119224853.  I am always surprised how this series of books does the job. Well written clear and concise , it is useful to the  all levels of ABM knowledge as a first read.   IT may downplay how much work this method really is and the importance of the very early work to success later on.  What the author decries today is very true and without a material change of approach by sales and marketing the waste of dollars and effort with continue.  ABM is not new, (I used to call it Key Account Management)  but it  can be very effective with the tools and approaches we know about.

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A Practitioner’s Guide to Account Based Marketing. Bev Burgess & Dave Munn.  2017. ISBN 9780749479893.  A very thorough treatment on the topic.  It would be my go to book for anyone wanting a deeper dive.  The numerous case studies  are well written and illustrate the point. Perhaps it is a bit too much on the very large companies as now the tools are available for this methodology to be used effectively by smaller firms.  Supplement this book with the steady stream of blog posts  on the topic and you will be all set. IMHO ABM is the way to go to make best use of your sales and marketing resources.

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Malcolm McDonald on Key Account Management. Malcolm McDonald & Beth Rogers. 2017. ISBN 978 0 7494 8077 6.  MacDonald is a giant in the field of marketing  and is one of Rocket Builders goto authors when we need to really dig into a topic. This co-authored book is very readable, current and immediately useful to enterprise sales and marketing teams who wish to look at their markets strategically.  I liked the entire book as it did a very clear job on describing and using the three levels in ABM and then how to id where to use and apply KAM. The liberal  use of case studies and experienced practitioners to describe how to use all this was excellent.   I really appreciated the work in Chapter 3 on auditing how you were doing and mapping out where you could go. The author is diligent at asking you to use measures and metrics that can be used and are useful.  As well Chapter 5 is good at mapping value, how to apply measures and package it so it can be taken to your clients.   Well worth the modern sales and marketing executive and strategic practitioners time to read and use this book

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