Marketing Playbook

Our first book review!

From publisher's weekly. If you subscribe you can find it here. If not you can see it on Amazon. Here's an excerpt

"This engaging primer contends that all marketing campaigns can be boiled down to five basic strategies, a typology distilled from the authors' experience as marketing executives at Microsoft and as venture capitalists. The "plays," schematized [are] with football diagrams...

This illuminating conceptual framework is perhaps less important than the authors' lucid analyses of real-world marketing situations, drawn from case studies and from their own gaffes and triumphs in marketing Excel, MS Office and other software milestones in Microsoft's march to monopoly. They throw in lots of practical tips ... The authors' wealth of insights, presented in a breezy, down-to-earth style free of management-theory cant, will give marketing managers much useful food for thought."

Advance praise for the Marketing Playbook

We've given a number of people a sneak peak at the book, The Marketing Playbook. Here's what some of them had to say (boy are we blushing):

"New ideas in marketing strategy are extremely rare. Rich Tong and John Zagula have come up with one with their system of battle-tested plays outlined in The Marketing Playbook. Marketing managers everywhere should open up their own playbooks and be prepared to start using some fascinating new ideas."
- Al Ries, co-author, The Origin of Brands & The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding

"The hardest part of marketing is the discipline required to figure out what, exactly, you are selling and how you should make the sale in the context of competition. Too many marketing folks want to quickly dispose of this step and get on to the creative part. The Marketing Playbook does a great job of reminding you of the importance of such up-front discipline and provides you simple, straight-forward steps to do it successfully."
- Bob Herbold, Former COO of Microsoft; former Senior Vice President, Advertising and Information Services at Proctor and Gamble; and Managing Partner, The Herbold Group LLC

"The Marketing Playbook is a must read, practical guide for anyone looking to create a winning marketing strategy for their business. Tong and Zagula take the shroud off the marketing black box and reveal a handful of surprisingly simple, market-proven principles. I'd recommend this book to anyone looking to improve their odds in today's competitive marketplace."
- Rob Schoeben, Vice President Applications Marketing, Apple Corporation

"For start-ups and established businesses alike, the Five Plays provide a really powerful, yet easy to use, kick-start to your strategy and great, simple guidance for getting your message heard. It is just this kind of thinking that can help you take the lead in a competitive market like we did with the search market in China."
- Robin Li, Co-Founder & CEO, Baidu, China's leading search engine

"The Marketing Playbook is like a "Best of Both Play" cross between Michael Porter's Competitive Strategy and Adrian Slywotzky's Art of Profitability. Its? powerful metaphors and insightful strategy tools make it a great addition to any business leader's arsenal."
- Dr. Mohanbir Sawhney: McCormick Tribune Professor of Technology and Director of the Center for Research in Technology & Innovation the Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University.

"John and Rich have had ringside seats to the launch and development of some of the most powerful brands in the world, and they've packaged that experience into strategies that you can put into motion the moment you finish the book. Obviously, tech marketers can benefit from this team's insights, but any company looking for a simple, powerful marketing system will fine value here."
- Christopher Ireland, Principal and CEO, Cheskin Consulting and Strategic Market Research

"We live in a world of highly tested and refined messages. You often only get one chance to do it right and be successful. Any business person entering a market, launching a product or kicking off a campaign would be well advised to read and heed the Marketing Playbook. Use it to test drive your strategy, hone your message and come back to it to stay on track as the results come in."
- Pam Edstrom, Founder and EVP, Waggener Edstrom (PR Agency of the Year)

"What others have unnecessarily complicated, Zagula and Tong have made remarkably simple. Their background may be Microsoft, but their playbook is relevant to virtually every business category."
- Stan Richards, Founder, The Richards Group (leading independent ad agency)

"The difference between champs and chumps is the ability to executive the right strategic marketing plays. The Marketing Playbook is a no-nonsense, insider?s look at how to choose and execute the right marketing strategy for your company."
- Christopher Lochhead, Chief Marketing Officer, Mercury Interactive Corporation

"High tech marketing - hell, any marketing - frequently hovers in the clouds, about 40,000 ft. above real customers. At best, it's a costly effort, run by pretty smart people, whose effectiveness is difficult to gauge. In The Marketing Playbook, Zagula and Tong have built a solid staircase between marketing strategy and real customer-driven results: Strategy that is tangible, actionable, and measurable. This is marketing, not as fodder for consultants, but as fuel for sales. Better get a copy before your next board meeting? and before your competition does!"
- Bob Stearns, Founder and Managing Director, Sternhill Partners and former Chief Technical and Strategy Officer, Compaq Computer Corp.

"Incredibly insightful. The Marketing Playbook is a must have for all marketing led organizations. It offers straightforward tools and approaches applicable to any situation."
- Scott S. Ballantyne, Marketing Vice President, T-Mobile

Entrepreneur and the Playbook

Work At Home Dad: The Marketing Playbook, Yup, thanks for your note. Appreciate your link.

Also, love to chat with you about the business you are starting. We have lots of questions for entrepreneurs and want to do some interviews of folks like yourselves if you have time.

Seattle Times on the Marketing Playbook: The Book

The Seattle Times: Business & Technology: "Playbook" analyzes marketing strategies. Yup, this is the Marketing Playbook web site.

The Marketing Playbook, the book will hit the shelves late this fall. To get it right now, you can:

• Bulk order a whole bunch from 1-800-CEO-READ. A great stocking stuffer for Fortune 500 companies (hint, hint :-) and for those of you have to have it right away.
• Pre-order it from your favorite bookstore. A great stocking stuffer for your kids, friends, collegues, clients (but don't let it into your enemies' hands). It is nearly the 1000th best selling book already (How this happened, I don't understand, but join in and help us keep up the trend :-)

Hey, for another local mention in the press see the Seattle PI's note.

Also for more Information. To get on our mailing list for the latest updates and other information.

"The Marketing Game"

Nice mention of our book and blog today in the Seattle Post Intelligencer's Insider. Scroll down to "The Marketing Game" to read about it.

Only nit to pick is that we clearly intend the book to be about a lot more than our experience marketing at Microsoft. It's all about making marketing work for anyone, in any competitive market, and it covers stories and examples from tons of companies in dozens of industries. Still, nice to see the mention in our hometown ;-)