The Tim Ferriss Show #343: Seth Godin on How to Say “No,” Market Like a Professional, and Win at Life
Saying "No"
- Pre-write thoughtful rejection paragraphs to avoid saying yes to too many things.
- Use text expanders for common rejections to save time and maintain professionalism.
Pricing Strategies
- Define what you'll do for free and what you charge for to filter requests effectively.
- Price yourself based on the value you provide, not just the task's cost.
Book Blurbs
- Blurbs rarely sell books but impact authors' self-perception and industry support. Seth Godin blurbs books if they offer value beyond their price, prioritizing published works.
- He only blurbs published books to manage requests.
Seth Godin (@thisissethsblog, seths.blog) is the author of 18 bestselling books that have been translated into more than 35 languages. He was inducted into the Direct Marketing Hall of Fame in 2013 and has founded several companies, including Yoyodyne and Squidoo. His blog (which you can find by typing “Seth” into Google) is one of the most popular in the world.
Seth writes about marketing, strategic quitting, leadership, the way ideas spread, and challenging the status quo in all areas.
His books include Linchpin, Tribes, The Dip, and Purple Cow, among others, and Seth’s newest book is This Is Marketing: You Can’t Be Seen Until You Learn to See. You can find out more at seths.blog/tim (tim = This Is Marketing, not my name), where you will also find a free PDF excerpt from the book and related videos.
Last but not least, Seth is the founder of the altMBA, an intense four-week online leadership and management workshop. Find out more at altmba.com.
In this episode, we explore many topics, including:
- How Seth deals with overwhelm
- How Seth chooses projects
- How to say “no” to the unimportant and set boundaries
- Long work vs. hard work
- The world’s worst boss
- How to find your “smallest viable audience”
- Non-marketing books that are master classes in great marketing
- Crafting April Fool’s jokes
- And much, much more…
Enjoy!
Click here for the show notes for this episode.
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