All Marketers are Liars: The Underground Classic That Explains How Marketing Really Works--and Why Authenticity Is the Best Marketing of All

I'm almost halfway through the book but I can't read it anymore b/c his writing style makes it hard to comprehend the ideas as you're reading.

The books starts out with a few main points: different people share a "worldview"- find a common worldview and figure out how to reach that group (and sell to them) by telling them a "story". The "story" consists of lies that people who share that worldview tell themselves to feel comfortable in the world. For instance - "food products labeled as organic help me live longer"... Its not necessarily a lie but its a view shared by many people who value their longevity (a shared worldview)... And that group of people will believe it whether or not organic-labelled food will actually help them live longer.

I've simplified his main idea, I think, and I didn't do it very well... that IS his main idea though. Its simple... pretty brilliant. However, the first 30 pages in the book tells it all, I believe. I don't think its necessary to read the rest... about halfway through the book, I'm finding some repetition of the main ideas...

Additionally, I'm having trouble getting through the rest of his book b/c of his writing style... its somewhat "conversational". He writes as if he is talking to a live audience. Which is fine... if you hear a speech, it is easy to follow the speakers line of though because lack of phrases and complete sentences are compensated by tone of voice and voice pitch. Its okay to be grammatically informal if you're talking aloud to someone else - rises and falls in the voice, emotion, even facial expression, help you follow the ideas. But on paper, I'm finding this way of writing hard to follow. His ideas are already somewhat complex and need a lot of explanation... so the writing style makes it harder to understand...

Reading this book is exhausting. I don't look forward to reading the rest.

I have heard much of Seth Godin. I decided to purchase 3 different titles and chose this one to read first.

Honestly ....after finishing it .. I am still not sure what I just read. I am pretty sure that he suggests that marketers should not lie. But .. can't say for certain that stories that he calls "fibs" aren't somewhat just small lies.

I like to use the highlighter when I purchase printed books .. and I did highlight some, but not what I usually do. I didn't find anything so outstanding that I would rate this book anything other than OK. I have no plans to suggest it to anyone.

Hopefully the other books I purchased (Linchpin and Purple Cow) will be better.

This was a quick and insightful read! In typical Godin writing style, he explains through example and storytelling how the business situations of today are asking not for commoditization and efficiency, but depth and personalization. Customers need a story to tell themselves in order to spend more on a product that is likely available cheaper somewhere else. Although I agree with many critiques noting that Godin's ideas may not be new in the business world, his delivery provides a much richer experience in learning about them than any textbook or MBA course likely would.

If you have a background in business, it likely that you will find this less than exemplary in relevant information. If you are new to business and marketing, this is a great way to introduce and start thinking around the topics in creative ways.

The title of Seth Godin’s book All Marketers Are Liars is misleading; in fact, it’s a lie. This is because in his book Godin explains that all marketers merely tell stories (as indicated on the redesigned cover). Although geared toward a marketing minded audience, as we read we find out that we are all marketers. This insight is gained in Godin’s explanation of how the storytelling technique is an everyday paradigm; people tell themselves stories and believe them. Thus, good marketers tell us authentic stories that we believe and then spread. He notes that as the technology is becoming more efficient, the emphasis is on the spreading of ideas by marketing, therefore on storytelling. Some of Godin’s notable points that explain this phenomenon are: consumers’ worldviews were there before you, people notice new and then guess, first impressions start the story, great marketers tell stories we believe and marketers with authenticity thrive.
Godin’s first point that a consumer’s worldview was there before you proves to be very important in proving his argument. He describes a worldview as “the rules, values, beliefs and biases that an individual consumer brings to a situation.”(p.39) Worldviews, along with frames (“elements of a story painted to leverage the worldview a consumer already has”) govern what stories consumers will believe. To support this, Godin uses the example of the General Mills team adapting to changes in a worldview when Atkins was implemented. General Mills quickly changed their popular Lucky Charms cereal recipe to a whole grain based product and leveraged this with the same old slogan “magically delicious!” Godin exemplifies that a company, to be successful, must tell an authentic story that adheres to the worldview of an audience and if that worldview changes adaptations must be made. This, along with multiple others of Godin’s examples, successfully explains that worldviews are there before you and a story must be framed in terms of this worldview to be successful. Godin sets up the rest of his book with this idea.
Next, Godin explains that people on notice what is new, and then they’ll guess about what to expect next. His most important example in explaining this is at the very end of this chapter. He talks about how diners at the Union Square Café rave about the service. However, these customers only do this because that is what they have persuaded themselves is true. Therefore the customers get the good service they expect because that’s the story that plays in their head and their brain makes their expectations come true. (p. 84) This human tendency, as Godin successfully describes, makes it easier to trick people into believing something is new and different. Godin’s clever use of describing how the brain works makes it clear that marketers can easily tell a story that isn’t all accurate and succeed in doing so. It’s interesting to see that this behavior is so common yet overlooked in being such a huge part of what succeeds and what doesn’t.
Godin goes on to explain another human behavior, snap judgments, which affect what a consumer thinks. He realizes that people will make snap judgments when buying something and will refuse to change his mind after that initial decision. This makes first impressions, not overly important, but pretty crucial in that it is the beginning of the story, even though the time of this first impression is ambiguous. Therefore, authenticity matters in generating a story that is going to be heard and repeated. He speaks about how people get upset when they find out recycling isn’t as effective as they thought and how New Yorkers were outraged when recycling was cancelled. Godin says, “The recycling lie was subtle, multifaceted and deeply seated.” (p. 94) Which he affirms is exactly the story you want to create for a brand to last. His explanation of this further proves that people will make loaded judgments in a fraction of a second, and refuse to change it once the decision has been made and marketers must realize this to be successful. Again, it is very interesting that such a behavior of stubbornness can have such a great affect on what stories will be believed. If someone makes this judgment and believes the story they will spread it, which rises the realization that marketing is almost entirely reliant on behaviors on the consumer.
Great marketers tell stories we believe. Godin starts this chapter by engaging the audience by making us the marketer. He then offers the idea of how to get elected as president. John Kerry failed at doing this because he didn’t tell a coherent story or a lie we wanted to believe because he didn’t live his story in everything he did. This non- cohesive story was unattractive and not believable so he wasn’t elected. This example shows that telling a story that consumers will believe is very important and if you don’t do this, as Godin explains, you’ll fail. Stories allow us to lie to ourselves and satisfy our desires. Therefore, it’s the story that please us, not the actually good or service. Basically, we want a good story, and then we’ll trust the product. If marketers can’t do that, they’ll lose.
In his final chapters, Godin offers some pretty great advice to becoming a successful brand: being authentic will allow you to thrive.
Authentic marketing, from one human to another, is extremely powerful. Telling a story authentically, creating a product or service that actually does what you say it will leads to a different sort of endgame. The marketer wins and so does her customers. A story that works combined with authenticity and minimized side effects builds a brand (and a business) for the ages. (p. 129)
This passage from his book affirms everything Godin has connected to the authenticity of a story. This advice achieves tying all of his main points together and applying them to a company, brand or oneself and how any off the facets of business can be successful in adhering to authenticity. This insightful and intriguing part of his book really brings everything together.
Amongst many other things, Godin’s simple syntax and lack of hard to understand jargon, I believe, attributed to his intriguing story about story telling in the marketing world. It interesting to see that human behavior is such a huge factor in the success of storytelling and that it actually drives this phenomenon. All facets of his book combine to create an idea about authenticity and its importance to successful storytelling, concluding that the real liars are the ones who can’t achieve this authenticity. This book is interesting, exciting and, most importantly, relevant. Not to mention incredibly enjoyable!

My first book from Seth Godin. I have since bought others by him. It's so easy to understand, that you don't want to put it down. It will make you see products and commercials in a whole new light.

His concepts are great, he's a brilliant man, but his book is basically him saying the same things over and over again while reinforcing how much of a joke all of our lives are. Look for his concepts online and save the money.

This was the first of Seth's books that I read. I really enjoyed this book. His concept of storytelling your product to the consumer is straight genius. It's the framework of marketing that really got me thinking about how I run my business.

What's written in the book will help your marketing mindset tremendously.

Seth always offers up some basic principles in a new way. I like the approach and agree with his view. A little repetitive at times, but still a great read for those that believe in flim-flam marketing and need to be set straight. Many who aren't in marketing don't know or don't believe in the power of the right story to deliver a compelling message. Seth's work shows the value of the right story to match the worldview/values of the target audience.

Hmmm, not much meat on this bone...I find it hard to give this more than a couple of stars. I recommend you pass and look for a book on the subject that goes a foot or two deeper.

Uninteresting and repetative. I threw this away after reading the first half, couldn't convince myself to read more or to pass it on to others. Seemed like a run on advertisement for itself.