Book Review: Meatball Sundae: Is Your Marketing Out of Sync?

Wendy Soucie
December 17, 2008 | COMMENTS

Well-known marketing expert Seth Godin is the author of Meatball Sundae: Is Your Marketing Out of Synch?. He believes old traditional marketing tactics (i.e., marketing to the mass media, print advertising, and direct mail) are the meatballs that have been used forever—think Super Bowl ads. Nuts, whipped cream, chocolate sauce, and cherries are the new social marketing conversations—think marketing tactics such as blogs, message boards, forums, interactive reviews, search marketing, etc.

In today's economy, you need to have a marketing mix that identifies what type of Internet media will deliver the information on your products and services to your target audience. The key is revamping your tactical approach by fundamentally transforming or creating different products and services for your customers.

These new concepts are shaking up the traditional marketing world, and the aftershocks are going to be with us from now on. According to Godin, we will want to use these tactics in the changing relationship we will have with our clients. With so much clutter in the media—offline and online—traditional marketing doesn't work like it used to. But that's OK for small- and mid-sized businesses, because they can't afford TV/radio anyway. With such a strong statement on mass media advertsing in this book, I wonder if Godin receives hate mail from the major networks from time to time.

The later parts of the book had good information on 14 trends impacting business in the 21 st century. In this section, Godin provided small company-success examples and golden nuggets to consider. He picked suitable small but agile firms and described how they branded themselves, created a message, and implemented their new marketing. In fact, during the first reading of the book, I was so intrigued I bought the audio version and listened to it twice more.

To make his point, one company he highlighted, www.blendtec.com, used Trend No. 8, “Infinite Channels of Communication.” Makers of industrial-grade blenders, this company started the viral marketing campaign, “Will It Blend?” where they threw random and crazy objects into their blenders; it's a YouTube success. The company has a main website with e-commerce, articles, recipes, and health tips, but they also have a microsite, www.willitblend.com, that people can visit and suggest blending ideas. It is a tremendous success! (I want to buy one of these blenders when mine finally dies). Godin even leverages this success by making a joint video to promote his book that is posted on YouTube.com and also on Squidoo.com, which Godin founded. My guess is that it was a successful effort for both.

What I liked best about the book is the optimistic perspective on how small- and mid-sized businesses can succeed today. This group is most likely to listen to clients, and listening to people creates products they want. Many companies in this size group are struggling with what they should be doing to jump-start their marketing engine. Most have relatively low marketing budgets and are frustrated at how really small it is when they are looking at TV, radio, and print advertising. The good news is that you can target your market demographics with the use of the Internet.

Wendy Soucie is a senior account executive with Sortis LLC, a marketing firm in Madison, Wisconsin. Contact her at 800-358-4753 or wsoucie@chorus.net.