Lara McCulloch

Lara McCulloch

On Posted on by Lara McCulloch to Best books on branding, Marketing Communications

Reading list for small business marketing and branding newbies

what-are-the-best-books-on-brandingI’m often asked what are the best books on branding and marketing for small businesses. Now, if you don’t know me you might not know that I’m a voracious reader and over the past 16 years as a brand practitioner I have a amassed vast library of business books, audio books and ebooks. Picking favorites is a difficult task, but here’s where I would start:

The Branding & Marketing Stalwarts

There are 3 people who, in my opinion, have consistently created thought-provoking material:

Al Reis (he has partnered with both Jack Trout and his daughter, Laura Reis to publish a series of great books)

  • Positioning: A Battle for your mind – This is often referred to as the bible for brand strategists, even though it was original published in the early 80s.
  • The Origin of Brands
  • The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding – Another fabulous reference book. Guaranteed you will go back to this book time and time again.

Seth Godin

  • Purple Cow
  • All Marketers are Liars
  • Tribes
  • Note: he also has a new book out that I have not yet read called, We are All Weird

Marty Neumier

  • The Brand Gap – How to bridge the difference between Business Strategy and Design
  • ZAG – The number one strategy of high performance brands

If you run a larger company, I would add David Aaker to the list who has published some great books on brand portfolio management and maintaining equity.

Other notables

Start with Why by Simon Sinek

Anything by David Ogilvy

Igor International’s blog

Brandchannel.com 

Again, this is just scraping the surface – it’s killing me not to turn this into a 2,000 word post 😉 So, do you have a favorite I haven’t listed? If so, what would you add?

Photo via ciro@tokyo

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