The CEO and Founder of my company ordered a bunch of copies of Seth Godin's Purple Cow. He gave them to all the department heads today and told us to have then read them by next Wednesday. It didn't take me long to figure out this book was nothing like Harold and The Purple Crayon, my son's favorite book.

Being something of a speed reader, I'm just about through with the book and will report that it is a great read. Seth Godin makes the point that to be a very successful business, one must now be REMARKABLE.

In the Golden Age of TV Advertising, companies thunked up a product, built a factory and advertised on TV. TV advertising drove product sales which generated profits that went back into TV advertising. The cycle got bigger and bigger and products could be branded for a long time. All good things must come to an end, however..

Because of the pervasion of mass advertisement, consumers now successfully block out most attempts to reach them.

Seth successfully uses the research of other marketing gurus to provide us with a bell curve that shows the name of the game is to now be REMARKABLE enough to grab the attention of Early Adopters who will influence a larger buying segment that is ignoring mass advertising.

The downside is a shorter product life cycle. Why? Because its hard to maintain the REMARKABLE aspect of a product or service. Something better or more clever will invariably come along.

Purple Cow throws out the P's of marketing and shows businesses how to market to a nation raised and jaded on traditional marketing.