Whether it is the TV commercial that breaks into our favorite program, or the telemarketing phone call that disrupts a family dinner, traditional advertising is based on the hope of snatching our attention away from whatever we are doing. Seth Godin calls this Interruption Marketing, and, as companies are discovering, it no longer works.

Instead of annoying potential customers by interrupting their most coveted commodity — time — Permission Marketing offers consumers incentives to accept advertising voluntarily. Now this Internet pioneer introduces a fundamentally different way of thinking about advertising products and services. By reaching out only to those individuals who have signaled an interest in learning more about a product, Permission Marketing enables companies to develop long-term relationships with customers, create trust, build brand awareness — and greatly improve the chances of making a sale.

In his groundbreaking book, Godin describes the four tests of Permission Marketing:

1. Does every single marketing effort you create encourage a learning relationship with your customers? Does it invite customers to "raise their hands" and start communicating?

2. Do you have a permission database? Do you track the number of people who have given you permission to communicate with them?

3. If consumers gave you permission to talk to them, would you have anything to say? Have you developed a marketing curriculum to teach people about your products?

4. Once people become customers, do you work to deepen your permission to communicate with those people?

And in numerous informative case studies, including American Airlines' frequent-flier program, Amazon.com, and Yahoo!, Godin demonstrates how marketers are already profiting from this key new approach in all forms of media.

Recognized as the pioneer of Permission Marketing, Godin is a sought-after speaker on the conference circuit, having presented at the Direct Marketing Association's annual conference, Jupiter events, and ICE, as well as international marketing forums. Last year, Godin was one of the highest ranked speakers, among 403 presenters at Internet World. He is a featured speaker at Fall, Spring and Summer I-Worlds. Godin is also the recipient of the 1998 Momentum Award, honoring outstanding Internet industry accomplishments.

Godin received an M.B.A. from Stanford Business School in 1984. Prior to graduating from Tufts University in 1982 with a degree in both Computer Science and Philosophy, Godin co-founded and ran one of the largest student-run businesses in the coutnry. From 1983 to 1986 he worked as a brand manager at Spinnaker Software, where he led the team that developed the first generation of multimedia products, working with such forward-thinkers as Arthur C. Clarke and Michael Crichton. He managed 40 engineers and introduced more than 60 software and video products to the marketplace.

Godin is the author and co-author of a number of top-selling business books, including E-Marketing, the first book ever published on how to do business online; The Guerilla Marketing Handbook, part of the best-selling Guerilla Marketing series; The Information Please Business Almanacm, a ground-breaking business reference book; and Permission Marketing: Turning Strangers into Freinds, and Friends into Customers.

Foreword by Don Peppers

Introduction

ONE The Marketing Crisis That Money Won't Solve

TWO Permission Marketing — The Way to Make Advertising Work Again

THREE The Evolution of Mass Advertising

FOUR Getting Started — Focus on Share of Customer, Not Market Share

FIVE How Frequency Builds Trust and Permission Facilitates Frequency

SIX The Five Levels of Permission

SEVEN Working with Permission as a Commodity

EIGHT Everything You Know About Marketing on the Web Is Wrong!

NINE Permission Marketing in the Context of the Web

TEN Case Studies

ELEVEN How to Evaluate a Permission Marketing Program

TWELVE The Permission FAQ

Acknowledgments

Index