Great books if you're getting started in online business

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amateursurgeon

amateursurgeon

Hot Metal and Methedrine
Apr 2, 2007
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The Uncanny Valley
Inspired by the fiction thread, thought I'd post a list of (non-fiction) books that have given me the most useful info in business. Hopefully one or two will be of interest.

Essentials
1. You can't teach a kid to ride a bike at a seminar - David Sandler (selling)
2. Influence - Robert Cialdini (marketing psychology)
3. Don't make me think - Steve Krug (web usability)
4. Do It Tomorrow - Mark Forster - (time management)
6. Purple Cow - Seth Godin (marketing, and why you have the advantage over big established corporates. Contains an abbreviated explanation of Geoffrey Moore's adoption curve, which is well worth understanding)

Worth a look for more general knowledge
6. The E-myth - michael gerber (templating your business)
7. The Black Swan - Nassim Nicholas Taleb (risk)

Also on a more "self help" note
8- What to say when you talk to yourself - Shad Helmstetter - (study this carefully if you ever find yourself struggling with the same negative habits again and again, or can't motivate yourself)
9- Think & Grow Rich - Napolean Hill (Difficult to read, seems a bit hokey at times, but some good lessons in there)


Post anything else you'd recommend reading...
 


1. How to Get Rich- by Felix Dennis "Maxim Magazine founder" (Wildly entertaining and useful information.)

2. Confessions of an advertising man-by David Ogilvy

3. Zero to one million- by Ryan Allis "Contact.com founder"

4. Consumer Behavior- by Michael R. Solomon

5. No B.S. Marketing to The Affluent- by Dan Kennedy

6. Ogilvy on Advertising- by David Ogilvy

7. The Age Curve- by Ken Gronback

8. The Art of Deception- by Kevin Mitnick
 
If you are getting into writing and copywriting "The Ultimate Sales Letter" by Dan S. Kennedy was a simple read for me. I'm sure there are better, but the tips in this one are easy to grasp and set-up step by step to getting and testing out good copy.
 
amateursurgeon said:
1. You can't teach a kid to ride a bike at a seminar - David Sandler (selling)
2. Influence - Robert Cialdini (marketing psychology)
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Amen. These two books will change your life. If you let them.

The first one is what taught me how to sell, along with a lot of hard work. But I consider it my sales bible.

The second one is pure genius on the psychology of what we do what we do.

These books won't only help you make better landing pages and write better sales copy and ads. They'll help you understand yourself more. And honestly in my experience that's 75% of the challenge. Us getting out of the way of ourselves. So the better you become at selling others the better you become at selling yourself :)

I know it sounds weird but selling ourselves == motivation :D
 
OK, here is one to AVOID:

The 80/20 principle - Richard Koch
Reason:
Waste of money and time. The guy takes the Pareto Principle and makes a book out of it. A fucking BOOK!
Here is all you need (oh and a half-working brain):

The Pareto principle (also known as the 80-20 rule, the law of the vital few and the principle of factor sparsity) states that, for many events, 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes. Business management thinker Joseph M. Juran suggested the principle and named it after Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto, who observed that 80% of income in Italy went to 20% of the population. It is a common rule of thumb in business; e.g., "80% of your sales comes from 20% of your clients."
It is worthy of note that some applications of the Pareto principle appeal to a pseudo-scientific "law of nature" to bolster non-quantifiable or non-verifiable assertions that are "painted with a broad brush".[citation needed] The fact that hedges such as the 90/10, 70/30, and 95/5 "rules" exist is sufficient evidence of the non-exactness of the Pareto principle. On the other hand, there is adequate evidence that "clumping" of factors does occur in most phenomena.[citation needed]
The Pareto principle is only tangentially related to Pareto efficiency, which was also introduced by the same economist, Vilfredo Pareto. Pareto developed both concepts in the context of the distribution of income and wealth among the population.


Source: Pareto principle - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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::emp::
 
I liked Purple Cow by Seth...

BUT!

The E-myth by Geber was shit. He could've condensed it into 100 pages or less. Fuck you Geber, add more content and less fluff.
 
Yeah - i agree there was too much fluff. A couple of the books on the list are like that, but are worth wading through because of 2 or 3 central ideas that are so valuable.
 
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