I have talked a good deal about permission marketing recently and how it contrasts to interruption marketing. It was brought to my attention that some of you might not really understand the difference, and so I would like to give you a brief review of the bible on the subject, Permission Marketing : Turning Strangers Into Friends And Friends Into Customers by Seth Godin. It was written back in 1999 so is a bit dated in places, but the all of the basic tenets still hold true.

Unlike a lot of Godin’s other books, this book is fairly long. Much of it is made up of examples of the strategies he is talking about, so you have plenty of other people’s mistakes and successes to learn from. But, for the meat of the matter, I would say two of the most important things he says are:

Permission Marketing Is . . .

• Anticipated - people look forward to hearing from you
• Personal - the messages are directly related to the individual
• Relevant - the marketing is about something the prospect is interested in

and later in the books is points out…

Permission Marketing As A Commodity

1. Permission is nontransferable.
2. Permission is selfish.
3. Permission is a process, not a moment.
4. Permission can be canceled at any time.

I have covered some of these items in past posts, such as cancellation, and I will cover more in the future. But, for a full explanation on permission marketing and how it is turning the trade on its ear, you really need to read this book.

In the meantime remember this one thing, if you are treating your customer as just that - a customer - and not a valued friend and partner, you are most assuredly doing something wrong.