Here are a few book suggestions, a marketing effectiveness reading list for those of you who’d like to get your head around the subject.
Recent research (here if you are interested) has shown that people retain information they read in a book better than when they read it on a screen. So here are a few book suggestions, a marketing effectiveness reading list for those of you who’d like to get your head around the subject matter, but would like a break from the white papers and infographics. Something to curl up with and really get your head into.
The Twelve Powers Of A Marketing Leader by Patrick Barwise and Thomas Barta
Patrick Barwise spoke at EffWeek 2016 in a session called “Beyond the Marketing Budget”. So it’s no surprise that one of the key powers he and Thomas Barta identify in great marketing leaders is the ability to get out of the marketing silo and work with others in the company who are influencing customer experience. This, and the other eleven powers that Patrick and Thomas detail, is not just finger in the wind stuff. They have mined evidence both from their own extensive research and from other peer-reviewed journals to create a list of most-wanted traits.
Equally relevant to those who want to advance their own career and those who are interested in promoting the status of the profession overall, the book has been described by Marshall Goldsmith (The Thinkers 50 #1 Leadership Thinker in the World) as “Everything you need to know to be a superior marketing leader.”
Buy
Twelve powers of a marketing leader
I’ll Have What She’s Having by Mark Earls, Alex Bentley and Michael J. O’Brien with a Foreword by John Maeda
If you want to influence people effectively, then knowing what makes them make the choices they make is a good thing. Self-proclaimed ‘Herdmeister’ Mark Earls, archaeologist and anthropologist Alex Bentley and anthropologist Michael J O’Brien explore the reality of human choice-making – a reality that is mired inextricably in the social world. We are not quite the individuals we perceive ourselves to be it seems. I’ll Have What She’s Having shows us how we use the brains of others to think for us and as storage space for knowledge about the world. It tells the story of how ideas, behaviour, and culture spread through the simple means of doing what others do. Mark spoke at EffWeek 2016.
Only Humans Need Apply by Tom Davenport and Julia Kirby
Tom Davenport is an expert in analytical thinking. His latest book, Only Humans Need Apply: Winners and Losers in the Age of Smart Machines is an exploration of how, in an age of artificial intelligence, smart machines and smart humans could work together. He argues that the future of increased productivity and business success isn’t either human or machine. It’s both. The key is augmentation, utilising technology to help humans work better, smarter, and faster. A fascinating look at how automation is already beginning to affect us and how we can adjust to make the most of it.
The Long and the Short of It by Les Binet and Peter Field
The Long and the Short of It: Balancing Short and Long-Term Marketing Strategies, is pretty much regarded as the bible on marketing effectiveness. Based on extensive research from the IPA Effectiveness Databank, Peter and Les masterfully paint a picture of advertising and marketing in the modern age of accountability, automation and short-term business cycles. If there’s on ebook you should read on effectiveness, this is probably it. Peter and Les presented their brand new research, which builds on ‘The long and The Short of It’, at Effectiveness Week on Monday 31 October 2016 and you can watch a video of their session here.
Decoded: The Science Behind Why we Buy by Phil Barden
Phil Barden is the first person to apply Daniel Kahneman’s Nobel Prize–winning work to marketing and advertising. His book is as good a summary of the cognitive sciences for marketers as you will find and uses theory from Behavioural Economics, psychology and neuro–economics. He shares the latest research on the motivations behind consumers’ choices and what happens in the human brain as buyers make their decisions. He deciphers the ‘secret codes’ of products, services and brands to explain why people buy them. And finally he shows how to apply this knowledge in day to day marketing to great effect by dramatically improving key factors such as relevance, differentiation and credibility.
Advertising Works 23 edited by Bridget Angear

Seven standalone essays from leading industry thinkers are published in it. They explore key issues facing advertising professionals, such as: customer experience innovation, effective targeting, getting the most out of a small budget and harnessing people power.
Beyond Advertising by Yoram (Jerry) Wind, Catharine Findiesen Hays, and the Wharton Future of Advertising Innovation Network
Over 200 innovators and visionaries from across industries, a wide breadth of disciplines, and spanning 22 countries, weighed in on the two simple yet compelling questions posed by WFoA in 2012 for our Advertising 2020 Project.
A synthesis of these bold and creative contributions, together with insights generated from decades of Professor Wind’s research, combine to offer new ways of thinking about today’s challenges and possibilities. The resulting book is for all those who are realising that far-reaching changes continue unabated in the field of advertising and marketing with far-ranging consequences beyond these disciplines.
Buy
Beyond advertising
How Brands Grow 1 & 2 by By Jenni Romaniuk & Byron Sharp
Byron Sharp is Professor of Marketing Science and Director of the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute – the world’s largest centre for research into marketing.
His book How Brands Grow: what marketers don’t know is based on decades of research that has progressively uncovered scientific laws about buying and brand performance. It was was voted marketing book of the year by AdAge readers when it was published.
How Brands Grow Part 2: Emerging Markets, Services, Durables, New and Luxury Brands is about fundamentals of buying behaviour and brand performance. It provides a roadmap for brand growth, and improved marketing productivity.
You can browse more learnings and key content from Effectiveness Week 2016 here.