Seth Godin’s How to Get Your Ideas to Spread

Evaluated by

Alan Herberger

Seth Godin

is an entrepreneur, blogger and

award winning author witha passion for marketing in

the digital age.

In his talk How to Get Your Ideas to Spread,Godin’s thesis is two-fold:

1. Successful ideas are ideas that spread through niche markets.

2. In order to spread, an idea must beremarkable (in that it is literally

remarked about).

To illustrate this point, Godin uses the example of a purple cow, explaining that to bespreadable, an idea must be notably different.

The 4th of the TED Commandments (“Thou Shalt Tell a Story”)was used effectively throughout the talk.

The talk starts by hooking the audience with a story about the successful (and unsuccessful) uses of idea spreading in the initial marketing of sliced bread.

The 8th of the TED Commandments (“Thou Shalt Remember All the While: Laughter is Good ”) was also used well, humor playing a major role in maintaining audience interest.

Godin made good use of Duarte’s rule of “Design, not Decoration”. All of his slides

were very minimalist in nature, the vast majority containing only images.

In this regard, the visuals were also an excellent display of Reynold’s concept of Restraint.

Unfortunately, the talk itself was a bit less

restrained.

Though not as problematic as in some of Godin’s

other talks, there was a tendency towards too

many examples and too little discussion.

As a result, some points were left under-explained and some parts of the talk

passed by in a blur.

Seth Godin is by no means a dull speaker, but because of his pacing issues, I can only give him a

4/5on dynamism.

In certain, technical ways, Godin’s talk was actually

better than Sir Ken Robinson’s. Godin’s

speech, for example, had a complete absence of

“ums” and “uhs,” whereas Ken used them

frequently.

Despite this, however, I found Sir Ken Robinson’s

speech to be more stimulating.

I believe this to be for two reasons:

1. Godin’s pacing issues mentioned before

2. Godin’s tendency to make far-fetched

comparisons

Listening to this talk has confirmed to me the importance of restraint in public

speaking. With more restraint, many of Godin’s mistakes would not have been a

problem.

My advice to the class would be to get as much mileage as possible from your

examples. Saying a lot with only a few examples is better than having a lot of

examples with no time to discuss them.

Citations

• TED Logo– http://www.jdean3.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/ted_logo1.jpg

• Toast – http://www.dinkuminteractive.com/how-habits-are-holding-your-com

pany-back/

• Cows – http://www.brianbatchelder.com/2009/06/-photo-by-matthew-

billingsleyviscerali.php

• TED Commandments– http://www.timlonghurst.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/05/ted

commandments.jpg

• Zen Garden– http://creattica.com/ipad/zen-garden/60759

Citations

• Seth Godin– Title slide:

http://sideoftheroadsessions.com/2012/05/seth-godins-naming-things/

– Bio slide: http://www.simrendeogun.com/seth-godin-geniuses-leaders-lizards-at-taom/

– Speaking: http://b.vimeocdn.com/ts/218/948/21894889_640.jpg– Portrait: http://shaneheywood.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/seth-

godin.jpeg

• Sir Ken Robinson– http://artsoced.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/robinson_ken_email.jp

g