Author: Jay Conrad Levinson
So after all this time, finally I'm doing another book review. I decided to read this book because one of my teachers recommended it. It took me quite a while to read; it's a long book with teeny tiny type in it. But that won't factor into the review. I will be reviewing on context, not on how long it took me to read the book- which was a while.
If you are into advertising and you want a job in advertising, or already have a career in advertising, this book is probably not for you (unless you are on the account side). This is more of a marketing book. That's why it says marketing in the title. But, if you have a small business, this book is definitely for you. It has all the tools you need to get your small business marketing plan off the ground.
One thing I didn't like about this book was the lack of real life examples. The author does use some, but he doesn't give any names of companies or people. I know he does this for anonymity, but I felt that I could not connect to anything in the book; it all seemed distant. I wish there were more real life examples. Th best ones that Levinson did put in were about his own experiences. Those felt more real to me than any of the other examples he put in, probably because he mixed in some fake examples with some real life ones.
I know I said that I wasn't going to talk about this, but some of the chapters were ridiculously long. They went on forever. I know the author was trying to be thorough, and he did a really good job of covering all his bases, but really, some chapters were 60-odd pages long. When a book has really long chapters, it feels like it takes even longer to read.
I felt that since I'm an advertising student, many of the chapters did not apply to me. Although the E-Media Marketing and Human Media Marketing chapters were particularly enlightening to me. In fact, the E-Media Marketing chapter actually helped me with this blog!
Some of the content was definitely good and worth the read. However, if you're planning on going creative in the advertising business, I'm really not sure that this book is for you. As I said before, it is more of a marketing book. Although there are some good tips about marketing yourself in this book, there are other, more advertising specific books that would probably help you more. But, if you have a small business, you should read this book because it doesn't tell you to go and buy expensive advertising; it tells you to create a long term plan for your business.
I'm not sure what else to say on that topic. I made my recommendations and I'm going to stick with them. It was worth reading, even if I don't feel that would help me. Hopefully, this book is right for you.
That's all for now.
