I just finished reading Meatball Sundae, Seth Godin’s latest book. It is mainly an account of what happens when old school companies try to use social media to sell commodity products.

Commodity products (the meatballs) and social media (the frosting and the cherry) don’t mix very well and the result is a mess (a meatball sundae).

The book, however, goes deeper than that. It talks at length about the new rules of marketing and the fourteen trends that are shaping the way products and ideas are communicated and sold:

• Direct communication and commerce between producers and consumers
• Amplification of the voice of the consumer and independent authorities
• The need for an authentic story as the number of sources increases
• Extremely short attention spans due to clutter
• The Long Tail
• Outsourcing
• Google and the dicing of everything
• Infinite channels of communication
• Direct communication and commerce between consumers and consumers
• The shifts in scarcity and abundance
• The triumph of big ideas
• The shift from “how many” to “who”
• The wealthy are like us
• New gatekeepers, no gatekeepers

Some of these trends deserve a more comprehensive treatment, so it wouldn’t be surprising if they end up as main topics of future books by Seth.

In Meatball Sundae, the author draws heavily from three of his previous books: Permission Marketing, Purple Cow and All Marketers are Liars, and successfully explains how the concepts covered in those books are now more relevant than ever thanks to the multiplying effect of new media like blogs and social networks.

For example he describes how, due to information overload and the possibility of getting almost anything at the click of a mouse, scarcity is shifting from product to attention. He then emphasizes that the best way to adapt to this new reality is to build a “permission asset” (basically the privilege to deliver anticipated, personal and relevant messages to people who want to get them).

Another clear point made in the book is that social media have the power to amplify word of mouth like never before, and that a product or idea is only going to spread in social networks is if it is truly remarkable (a Purple Cow). Press releases of boring products will never show up in Digg…

Seth also cites a couple of well known examples: George Allen’s infamous “macaca” incident, and the case of the sleeping Comcast repairman, to emphasize the importance of telling authentic stories. Whether you like it or not, blogs and Youtube will keep you honest, since anything you say or do has the potential to be seen, heard or read by millions of people almost instantly.

Meatball Sundae is an engaging read, full of case studies and examples that give support to the author’s main points. There is also a helpful executive summary, and each chapter is preceded by a takeaway box containing its main highlights.

Early in the book, Godin confesses that his short books usually outsell his longer ones, and that he made Meatball Sundae long on purpose. Why? Because he wants us to understand that just dabbling in New Marketing is not going to cut it, and that companies and products must now be built from scratch to adapt to the New Marketing and not the other way around. But, most importantly, he wants us to act on it.

With so many blogs covering social media and so much disjointed information about it floating around, I had been trying to find a resource that talked about social media within an organized framework, from the basics to more advanced topics and concepts.

Fortunately, in their recently published ebook Getting to First Base: A Social Media Marketing Playbook (PDF format – 104 pages), Darren Barefoot and Julie Szabo take a good swing at it (no pun intended) and give us a comprehensive overview of social media, from its definition down to strategic and tactical advice drawn from their experience running Capulet Communications, their social media marketing company.

The first few pages are dedicated to explaining who is the intended audience of the book. After reading the book, I concluded that the people who would mostly benefit from it are those who have some basic knowledge of PR, advertising or Internet marketing, for example:

• People who were already active in Web 1.0 running a static site, email newsletter, etc. and want to take the leap to Web 2.0 but don’t know where to start.
• People who have started a blog but don’t know how to promote it or use it effectively to build their brand.
• People with experience in traditional marketing and PR but little awareness of the possibilities that social media may offer.

This book is not for Internet marketing novices, nor for people who are already proficient in blogging and/or are advanced users of the different social networking or social bookmarking sites.

The three sections I enjoyed the most (and found most useful) are:

• The explanation of the differences between social media and traditional, mainstream media.
• The detailed diagrams that outline the scope of the social media environment.
• The recommendations on how to approach influential bloggers and how to make a pitch. I particularly appreciated the real-life examples provided by the authors, who candidly share their experiences (both successful and unsuccessful) with actual customers.

The book may leave you yearning for more when it talks about the main social networking and social bookmarking sites. Not all sites are profiled (for example, MySpace is left out) and those who are included are not dealt with in a very detailed manner. This is understandable, though, since the objective of the book is to present a broad overview of social media and not to go too deep into any particular subject.

Overall, this book will help you achieve a better understanding of the landscape of social media, make your site social media ready, launch a social media relations campaign, and identify the risks and pitfalls of social media marketing.

I particularly liked the authors’ writing style, from the tongue-in-cheek title selection (Getting to First Base) to the different metaphorical references to dating, like “courting” influential bloggers, the”dating” stage of social media, etc.. This choice of words really helps convey the core message of the book, namely that social media marketing is all about developing authentic, transparent long term relationships (with readers, customers and other bloggers).

I believe this book fulfills its promise to take you to first base in your social media marketing efforts. I also found more than enough value to justify the book’s price point (the real life examples and the sound advice on how to pitch influential bloggers are alone probably worth much more). When you also factor in that the book will be constantly updated, and that the updates will be sent to you automatically and free of additional charges, the book is a real bargain at $29.