10 Book Gifts for Marketers, Bloggers, and Internet Junkies

Welcome to the world of Socialnomics-where consumers and the societies they create online have a profound influence on our economy and the businesses that operate within it. Online word of mouth and the powerful influence of peer groups have already made many traditional marketing strategies obsolete. Today's best businesses and marketers are learning to profitably navigate this new landscape.

Brands can now be strengthened or destroyed by the use of social media. Advertising is less effective at influencing consumers than are the opinions of their peers, making direct-to-consumer marketing messages less valuable each day. But savvy companies are using online networking sites as massive focus groups and as an efficient means of communication with consumers. If social media isn't a part of your business strategy, you've already fallen behind the curve-and your competition.

Social media has democratized influence, forever changing the way businesses communicate with customers and the way customers affect the decisions of their peers. With platforms like Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook, anyone can now find and connect with others who share similar interests, challenges, and beliefs-creating communities that shape and steer the perception of brands. Without engagement in these communities, we miss major opportunities to shape our marketing messages.

However, use of the tools does not guarantee that people will listen. Engagement is shaped by the interpretation of its intentions. In order for social media to mutually benefit you and your customers, you must engage them in meaningful and advantageous conversations, empowering them as true participants in your marketing and service efforts.

With Engage! as your guide, you can effectively compete in this new era of digital Darwinism while engendering the support of online champions.

From one of the leading experts in viral and social marketing-market your business effectively to today's customers

For generations, marketing has been hypocritical. We've been taught to market to others in ways we hate being marketed to (cold-calling, flyers, ads, etc.). So why do we still keep trying the same stale marketing moves?

UnMarketing shows you how to unlearn the old ways and consistently attract and engage the right customers. You'll stop just pushing out your message and praying that it sticks somewhere. Potential and current customers want to be listened to, validated, and have a platform to be heard-especially online. With UnMarketing, you'll create such a relationship with your customers, and make yourself the logical choice for their needs.

* Shows how to create a mindset and systems to roll out a new, 21st century marketing approach
* Marketing expert Scott Stratten focuses on a Pull & Stay method (pulling your market towards you and staying/engaging with them, leading them to naturally choose you for their needs) rather than Push & Pray
* Redefines marketing as all points of engagement between a company and its customers, not just a single boxed-in activity

Traditional marketing methods are leading to diminishing returns and disaffected customers. The answer? Stop marketing, start UnMarketing!

There's no question that the Internet has changed the way we do business-especially when it comes to marketing. Consumer environments are short on trust and populated by consumers who are cynical, savvy, and informed. Though it's easier than ever to reach your customers, it's less likely that they'll listen. Today, the most valuable online currency isn't the dollar, but trust itself.

At the same time, social networks and personal connections have far more influence on consumers than your marketing messages ever will-unless your business knows how to harness them. In Trust Agents, two social media veterans show you how to tap into the power of these networks to build your brand's influence, reputation, and profits.

Trust agents aren't necessarily marketers or salespeople; they're the digitally savvy people who use the Web to humanize businesses using transparency, honesty, and genuine relationships. As a result, they wield enough online influence to build up or bring down a business's reputation. This book will show you how to build profitable relationships with trust agents, or become one yourself.

In an online world defined by its transparency, becoming a trust agent is no easy task, but once you've established your reputation, you can build influence, share it, and reap the benefits of it for your business. When you've learned a trust agent's secrets, your words can carry more power and more weight than any PR firm or big corporate marketing department.

The Social Media Bible, Second Edition delivers the most comprehensive single resource available for marketing in the social media universe. Here you'll find top-to-bottom coverage of the tactics, tools, and strategies to successfully grow your business in these new media channels.

Revised and updated with user-generated feedback and content, this Second Edition features the latest techniques, platforms, technologies, people, companies, and more, enabling you to make smart moves in the social media world and get the most out of your marketing strategy. Inside this new edition, you'll discover:

* The 100-plus best companies providing software, sites, apps, gaming platforms, and more
* The five steps for developing a successful social media marketing plan
* How to win in social media whether you're a one-person company or a Fortune 500 company
* Additional online content available for book purchasers
* Interviews with 50 different experts, from Twitter inventor Biz Stone to social media marketer extraordinaire Gary "V" to senior vice presidents at YouTube, Yahoo!, Microsoft, Google, and FlickrHow to measure social media ROI, including numerous examples from companies of all sizes

While the entrepreneurial strategies in this book do take time, it's completely reasonable to start the effort as an after-work project to build up until you're able to replace your current income with the income from your online presence. While you may have to fall behind on the current season of Lost or let your Madden 2010 game suffer, because you'll be doing something you love you won't mind putting in the extra effort.

In Crush It, Gary Vaynerchuk shows how anyone can build a career around what they're passionate about. He also delivers both high-level and platform specific strategy and analysis, allowing you to take advantage of the current business environment while preparing you to succeed as it changes and evolves.

This book isn't interested in making unrealistic promises while glossing over the work involved. Making a living by building content around your passion isn't simple and it doesn't happen overnight. What it is, however, is fulfilling and in most cases just as profitable, if not more so, than your previous job.

Furthermore, a business can't just pay lip service to social media and expect it to return results. The transparency and accountability inherent in its structure necessitates a comprehensive and dedicated strategy in order to reap its tremendous benefits.

By combining practical analysis and strategy with the same passion and humor that's made Gary one of the most in demand keynote speakers in the U.S. as well as network television's go to wine expert, Crush It is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand and harness the future of business and work.

Short on pages but long on repetition, this newest book by Godin argues that lasting and substantive change can be best effected by a tribe: a group of people connected to each other, to a leader and to an idea. Smart innovators find or assemble a movement of similarly minded individuals and get the tribe excited by a new product, service or message, often via the Internet (consider, for example, the popularity of the Obama campaign, Facebook or Twitter).

Tribes, Godin says, can be within or outside a corporation, and almost everyone can be a leader; most are kept from realizing their potential by fear of criticism and fear of being wrong. The book's helpful nuggets are buried beneath esoteric case studies and multiple reiterations: we can be leaders if we want, tribes are the way of the future and change is good.

On that last note, the advice found in this book should be used with caution. Change isn't made by asking permission, Godin says. Change is made by asking forgiveness, later. That may be true, but in this economy and in certain corporations, it may also be a good way to lose a job.

In Social Media 101, social media expert and blogger Chris Brogan presents the best practices for growing the value of your social media and social networking marketing efforts. Brogan has spent two years researching what the best businesses are doing with social media and how they're doing it. Now, he presents his findings in a single, comprehensive business guide to social media.

You'll learn how to cultivate profitable online relationships, develop your brand, and drive meaningful business. Brogan shows you how to build an effective blog or website for your business, monitor your online reputation and what people are saying about your business online, and create new content to share with your customers.

* Presents specific strategies, tactics, and tips to improve your business through improved social media and online marketing
* Looks at social media and the wider online universe from a strictly business perspective

If you aren't using the Internet and social media to market your business and stay in touch with your customers, you're already falling behind. The Social Media 100 gives you 100 effective, proven strategies you need to succeed.

A completely revised and updated edition of the BusinessWeek bestseller on effective, modern marketing and PR best practices

The New Rules of Marketing and PR shows you how to leverage the potential that Web-based communication offers your business. Finally, you can speak directly to customers and buyers, establishing a personal link with the people who make your business work.

This new second edition paperback keeps you up-to-date on the latest trends.

* New case studies and current examples are included to illustrate the very latest in marketing and PR trends.
* Completely updated to reflect the latest marketing and PR techniques using social media sites such as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube
* Includes a step-by-step action plan for harnessing the power of the Internet to communicate directly with buyers, increase sales, and raise online visibility
* David Meerman Scott is a renowned online marketing strategist, keynote speaker and the author of World Wide Rave, from Wiley

The New Rules of Marketing and PR, Second Edition gives you all the information you need to craft powerful and effective marketing messages and get them to the right people at the right moment-at a fraction of the price of a traditional marketing campaign.

Whether you're a blogger, a small company, a well-known global enterprise, or an aspiring queen of the Internet, Mac shows how to make the most of social networking tools, including:
-Targeting the right networks
-Feeding and seeding a community
-Authentically engaging with customers and fans
-Managing your online friendships on a daily basis and on a budget

This isn't a book of abstract theories or complicated strategies. Mac writes from personal experience: she built a huge fan base through social networking. She also draws on real-life and up-to-date examples to give you the information you really need in order to establish and maintain credibility and meaningful relationships online.