Fifty Books on Entrepreneurship (Part Four)

IV. Marketing

39. The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing – by Al Ries & Jack Trout
    Al Ries and Jack Trout lay down 22 timeless rules about marketing in this little book. It’s all about branding, market positioning, and figuring out how to actually survive (and maybe even win) in cutthroat markets.
    Ad: The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing, Pinduoduo group price ¥119.00 [Buy]

40. Epic Content Marketing – by Joe Pulizzi
    Joe Pulizzi dives into how you can stand out and win more customers by creating content that people actually want to read. The gist: focus on a few pieces of really good content, not a firehose of mediocrity, to attract and keep your tribe.

V. Growth Management

41. Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise – by Anders Ericsson and Robert Pool

• About the Author: Anders Ericsson, a psychologist, spent his career studying how people become world-class in their fields—he’s the “deliberate practice” guy.
• What’s Inside: The book digs into how anyone can get really good at anything, busting the myth of “talent” and zeroing in on the grind of purposeful practice.
• Why It’s Cool: If you’re chasing mastery (or just trying to suck less), it’s full of concrete drills and insights on the long, slow road to getting better.
  Ad: Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise, Pinduoduo group price ¥25.80 [Buy]

42. Scaling Up: How a Few Companies Make It...and Why the Rest Don't – by Verne Harnish

• About the Author: Verne Harnish is a go-to guy on business growth and leadership, especially for the small-to-medium crowd.
• What’s Inside: Covers how to wrangle people, strategy, execution, and cash flow as your company tries to grow without blowing up.
• Why It’s Useful: Lays out frameworks and practical tools for keeping things sane and efficient even when you’re growing like crazy.

43. Growth Hacker Marketing: A Primer on the Future of PR, Marketing, and Advertising – by Ryan Holiday

• About the Author: Ryan Holiday writes bestsellers and gets called a marketing guru, but mostly he’s good at breaking things and figuring out how to make them go viral.
• What’s Inside: The book looks at how to use lean, scrappy, and sometimes downright weird tactics to grow fast—on a shoestring.
• Why It’s Fun: Gives entrepreneurs and marketers a new playbook for the digital age, perfect if you’re running a startup with more dreams than cash.
  Ad: [Fan Deng recommends] Growth Hacker by Sean Ellis, JD.com ¥38.40 [Buy]

44. Dual Transformation: How to Reposition Today's Business While Creating the Future – by Scott D. Anthony, Clark G. Gilbert, Mark W. Johnson (2017)

• About the Authors: All three are big names in innovation and business strategy, with plenty of consulting scars and success stories.
• What’s Inside: Talks about how to upgrade what you’ve already got while also chasing new growth at the same time—a tough juggling act.
• Why It’s Interesting: Their frameworks help you find new ways to grow without getting wiped out by change.

45. Platform Scale: How an emerging business model helps startups build large empires with minimum investment – by Sangeet Paul Choudary

• About the Author: Choudary is a platform economy guy—he advises businesses on how to build and scale platforms, and nerds out on network effects.
• What’s Inside: Breaks down how digital platforms can snowball into empires with surprisingly little upfront investment.
• Why It’s Insightful: If you want to get your head around network effects and platform economics, especially for tech and internet startups, this is the one.

46. Small Giants: Companies That Choose to Be Great Instead of Big – by Bo Burlingham

• About the Author: Burlingham’s an old hand at business journalism, with a soft spot for small and mid-sized companies.
• What’s Inside: Stories of companies that decided to focus on being excellent, not just growing for growth’s sake.
• Why It’s Refreshing: Upends the usual “bigger is always better” gospel, and makes a case for company culture and values as the real engine of long-term success.
  Ad: Small Giants – 10th Anniversary Edition, Pinduoduo group price ¥118.00 [Buy]

47. The Innovator's DNA: Mastering the Five Skills of Disruptive Innovators – by Jeff Dyer, Hal Gregersen, Clayton M. Christensen

• About the Authors: Three heavyweights in innovation studies, especially around what makes disruptors tick.
• What’s Inside: Lays out five key skills that innovators tend to have and how you can develop them to make your own team or business more inventive.
• Why It’s Practical: Comes with tools and methods to help leaders nurture a culture where new ideas can actually happen.

48. Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder – by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

• About the Author: Taleb has made a career out of thinking about risk, randomness, and why most of us are terrible at predicting anything.
• What’s Inside: He introduces “antifragility”—systems (and people, and companies) that don’t just survive chaos, but actually get stronger from it.
• Why It’s Provocative: Offers a roadmap for how to thrive when everything’s unpredictable—definitely not your usual “resilience” handbook.
  Ad: Antifragile (New Edition), Pinduoduo group price ¥28.56 [Buy]

49. Creating Strategy: A Practical Guide – by Michael Bernard

• What’s Inside: A hands-on guide to building a strategy for business growth, step-by-step, from the ground up. Stresses rooting every strategy in your company’s actual goals, mission, and values, and walks you through writing, getting buy-in, and executing creative strategies.

50. Blitzscaling: The Lightning-Fast Path to Building Massively Valuable Companies – by Reid Hoffman and Chris Yeh

• What’s Inside: Breaks down how companies can (sometimes) grow at breakneck speed in totally uncertain territory. Looks at why some startups rocket to global dominance, while others just flame out.
  Ad: Blitzscaling (English edition), Pinduoduo group price ¥101.94 [Buy]