Reading Update January 2016

One of my personal projects for the year is to read (listen to – I’m an Audible.com freak) 24 business books.  Please check out my Reading board on Pinterest for other books I love.

January was a good month for reading.  I cranked out 4 books.  This is all part of my master plan for having an outstanding, amazing, breakthrough year!  Below is a quick summary of each one.

Content Inc is all about how business is changing and how content and the internet is the platform to this new game.  If you have a content vacuum, how can people (more importantly your current and future customers) understand who you are and what you have to offer.  Perfect example is Joe’s site promoting the book.  How many books that you’ve read have their own movie trailer?  Joe’s approach is to build an audience first!  Align your passion, ensure that you have a unique offering, develop your style & tone, build your base and then reap the rewards for all the hard work!  Must read.  It has to be part of your business model.

I swear I didn’t do this on purpose but Oversubscribed was the perfect follow up book to Content Inc.  Daniel Priestly authored one of my all time favorite books – Entrepreneur Revolution. This new book Oversubscribed didn’t disappoint. Oversubscribed tees off on the same principles as Content Inc. Content is critical to building your audience and filling the vacuum of what you and your organization are all about and then the book goes takes that model so much further. Its all about supply and demand.  Its all about building anticipation with your audience and then celebrating your customers!  What can be more powerful that actually celebrating your customers?

Again I don’t think I could have picked a better book to come next.  I’ve been following Kerry Bodine and Harley Manning on social media for some time.  Outside In is an insane blueprint to what my company Zuggand is doing to help our customers deliver Digital Customer Experiences (DCX).  Again this book is in alignment with the previous two books in that we have passed out of the Age of Information and into the Age of the Customer (and execution).  Being customer centric (or obsessed) is the new differentiator.  The authors take a research based approach (which I love) to systematically designing customer experiences.  I love the examples in the book.  And we aren’t talking about little websites you’ve never heard of.  This book has the Forester brand, research and army behind it and is working with amazing customer-obsessed companies like USAA and Fidelity.  So many takeaways and it lays out a plan for any business to go through this customer experience transformation. It can also be used as a brilliant career development plan for any person that aspires to be a Chief Customer Officer or a Chief Digital Officer.

I read about Gary Vaynerchuk and his Wine Library store years ago.  An amazing story about how Gary help build and transform his family store into an impressive enterprise.  It wasn’t until about a year ago that I first saw him on youtube with his new brand though.  I’ll admit that at first I was a bit turned off.  It’s funny because before I even started writing this article, I saw this post on Instagram from Gary today.

I love a good F-Bomb like no one else, but when I heard him drop it in the first minute of a video it shocked even me. (Did I mention that I LOVE a good F-BOMB???) Maybe it is his “east” cost style that rubbed my “west” coast style.  But then I saw this video on 6 MINS FOR THE NEXT 60 YEARS OF YOUR LIFE – A RANT.  And now (and I can’t believe I’m going to say this) I am (BIG sigh) part of the Vaner Nation. (f*#* I said it!)

Again, this couldn’t have been a better book for me right now.  Its his oldest book that is on Audible so I decided to start there and catch up.  Gary stays true to his DNA, as he loves to say.  He knows his strengths and he plays to them.  He is a master of his craft.  In his DailyVee video on January 27th The Family Business (you can jump to 6 mins and 54 seconds if you like) he articulates what he does for a living.  “I day trade attention.”  That’s what this book is about.  That is what Gary is all about. That is what each and everyone of us should be about!