Today I flew out from San Francisco after speaking to the Northern California Book Publicity and Marketing Association luncheon yesterday on ”Online PR and Social Media,” and spent the flight listening to the Dead on my iPhone.
This was shortly after having coffee in Sausilito this morning with my friend Ann Matranga at The Depot. We sat outside and watched the kids play in Lytton Square which Bill Graham helped create and we talked about the Dead.
So it seems synchronistic, speaking of the Dead that David Meerman Scott and Brian Halligan today announced, Marketing Lessons from the Grateful Dead: What Every Business Can Learn from The Most Iconic Band in History (Wiley, 2010).
There are so many reasons why this book is cool, but I have to be honest and say I love Chapter 8: Encourage Eccentricity and the whole focus on the fans and marketing.
I love it because it reveals how a company or band or individual can tap into the power of differentiation and eccentricity to make their way in the world. Not only can this bring you success, but it’s the right thing to do!
To quote from that chapter, “The Grateful Dead teaches us that we are all eccentric in some ways. Smart companies understand eccentricities and create a market from them.”
I also like this from the book, ”Deadheads are your neighbors, coworkers and friends.” As a dancing bear tattooed Deadhead I’ll have to confess, I know the deadheads, the deadheads are friends of mine, and I am proud to still be one!
As Bill Walton says in the foreword of the book, “Like other daring visionaries The Grateful Dead rejected conventional wisdom.”
That’s why we are still dancing – and that’s really how you can build a fan base that even after all these years is still trading Dead stories, tapes, t-shirts and mementos of their time drifting with the Dead.
So any marketing lesson that Scott and Halligan share in this book you definitely should tune into.
Go see David’s post all about the book tour at his site.
And check out his new tie-dye pic on the site too. Wonderful.
Meanwhile, me and my dancing bear will be digging the marketing nuggets of this extraordinary and timely book on marketing!
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