Authors

As social media and word of mouth marketing slowly mature as disciplines, I'm glad that more and more people are writing books on the subject. Because as much as I love the stream of consciousness info flood that I get through my blog reader every morning, it's also nice to explore a subject in a more deliberate way.

John Cass of IMO Wireless, my 12th interview and one of the first people to believe in my 1,000 podcast project enough to spend some time with me, has recently written a great book (

For this interview, I hopped the pond (aka the Atlantic) via Skype to chat with an expert on new media, online marketing, and eBusiness named Chris Garrett. A web addict from the early days (1994!), recently part of the Performancing team until it was acquired, and now an independent consultant, Chris helps companies sell more online.

One of the great things about blogging, podcasting and other forms of social media is how open and diverse they are. That dynamic leads one to discover people who have done cool things like Bob Prentice. Bob is a motivational speaker who between April 2005 and April 2006 recorded 55 motivational podcasts. The podcasts were a natural extension of his past experience in radio and his current passion/business as a motivational speaker.

Pitching, proposals, business development and, even, gasp, sales are part of every surviving agency or consultant's life. We all accept that it must be done but, if you're like most, you have a major love/hate relationship with it. In this podcast, I chat with Blair Enns, a consultant who has built his business around teaching agencies to WIN WITHOUT PITCHING. That's potentially a little slice of heaven if you ask me.

Podcasting is still a pretty immature trend compared to other forms of social media though some recent research shows awareness and knowledge slowly growing. Since the space is changing so fast, I was lucky enough to chat with Leesa Barnes, a podcaster, author, speaker and consultant who is "in the trenches" on a daily basis.

Gerry McGovern, my 107th interviewee, has two huge factors going for him in life. The first is an uncanny knowledge of website content management and how to design powerful user experiences. The second is an accent that is ridiculously cool. I can't decide which I'm more jealous of.

Gerry was generous enough to share his knowledge about the long neck, how to design better web experiences, and more.

Enjoy!

Software as a Service (SaaS) is a huge trend. From email to accounting to windows to CRM, everyone is jumping on board.

Branding is an often overlooked, frequently screwed up and extremely important marketing skill. Last Friday, I was fortunate enough to get to pick the brain of Tom Asacker, a leading expert on branding in order to find out why so many companies get it wrong.

Naked Conversations is one of those books that you can't go 15 minutes in the blogosphere without tripping over. Coauthored by Shel Israel and Robert Scoble, it gives some great advice to bloggers new and old.