The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing: Exposed and Explained by the World's Two

I'd read the book when it was best seller. I recently found it referenced in an interesting context and decided to read it again. The re-read made me feel like a business strategy time traveler. This 13-some-year-old book for “Marketing” was written when the Sales, Marketing and Biz Strategy organization was silo'd. The ‘22 Immutable Laws of Marketing’ is once again making its way through academics and biz leaders as common wisdom for the whole modern enterprise. It's a guide book that should be titled "Never Do This!" while hinting at the remarkable strategies that bring us today's top brands. ‘The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing’ is a quick read. The management and strategy job has evolved in interesting ways from this books timeframe. The day of the “Ad Man” fronting your enterprise’s value proposition to customers is over. The “Sale!” is made after a carefully engineered organizational effort. Marketing strategy is a discipline to be trained among everyone that answers an outside phone. Everyone now has a marketing role and here is not a bad place to start spreading the news. A hugely entertaining element is simply that the reader has been fast forwarded through corporate strategies tried, failed and successful. Lotus 1-2-3, VisiCalc, Amiga, Emery Air vs FedEx, Tandem, Wang ... all without smart phones or vast system networks ... strategy winners and losers make for a forensic business case ... if you've been around awhile, you won't believe the book was written just 15 years ago.

The author has a great writing style as he delivers the information with pure value no fluff, making it easy and satisfying to read. The laws all make sense and complement each well with no contradictions.

First published in 1993, "The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing" by Al Ries and Jack Trout has become an invaluable resource for both aspiring and established marketers. And no wonder: This little book is bursting at the spine with powerful, actionable marketing insights. Take for example Law #4: The Law of Perception. This law states that "Marketing is not a battle of products, it's a battle of perception." The treatment given to this law - complete with real world examples and strategies for implementing it in your own business - is worth the book's asking price all on its own. That Ries and Trout offer so many additional marketing "bon mots" to go along with this one only increases the book's value. Throughout "22 Laws" Ries and Trout challenge commonly held marketing beliefs. They tackle - mercilessly but with a good dose of humor - such sacred cows as line extension, leadership, and - gasp! -- admitting product negatives. You'll be engaged from one page to the next. And at just under 150 pages, "22 Laws" is a quick read. Work your way through the book over your morning cup of coffee and start implementing what you've learned after lunch. Do I have any complaints? Well, as some other readers have mentioned a fair few of the laws do seem to overlap considerably with others. This wasn't a problem for me. I felt like even those laws that were treading familiar ground offered up enough nuance to justify their inclusion. My biggest gripe isn't really even the book's fault. Like all books, "The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing" is a product of its time. Written nearly two decades ago this poses certain problems for today's reader. In terms of human behavior, twenty years is nothing. Folks are still looking to products to satisfy their needs for validation, excitement, security - whatever. And the savvy marketer is going to take full advantage of this. What has changed - and changed dramatically - since 1994 is our available technology. Ries and Trout couldn't have possibly envisioned the growth of the Internet and the impact it would have on the global marketplace. As a result, certain laws such as Law #22: The Law of Resources are challenged to the point of irrelevance. The Law of Resources states that "Without adequate funding an idea won't get off the ground." This is okay in so far as it applies to major companies. If I'm planning to take on Apple in the smartphone market, yes, my coffers had better be plenty deep. However, in this era of e-commerce, digital distrobution, and social media - to name but a few channels - products can be launched for relatively little. Shoestring budget? Shoestrings have never stretched so far. More bothersome is Ries and Trout's assertion that "You'll get farther with a mediocre idea and a million dollars than with a great idea." Thankfully, the advent of the Internet - and Web 2.0 in particular - ensures that this statement is now resoundingly false. Do plenty of crummy products still dominate the market thanks to big budget ad campaings? Absolutely. (I'm looking at you Justin Bieber.) But it's also never been easier for a product to command market share on its merit alone. If your product is truly special there are all sorts of ways to harness the power of blogs, social media, Amazon reviews, et al to build a receptive audience. On the other hand, if you release a turd to the market, well, prepare to have folks make a stink about it ... and that's going to cost you. We the people are the new kingmakers; not the mavens of Madison Avenue. Even with this caveat on the table, I highly recommend "The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing". While I believe "immutable" is stretching it - for some laws more than others - there's more than enough insight on offer in this little book to justify a purchase and close reading. I look forward to revisiting this book throughout my sales and marketing career.

This tiny book was one of my favorite books in grad school. It had been a requirement for one of my classes, but I continued to use it for sources and such when I did papers. Mr. Ries and Trout do a great job providing 22 of the main marketing strategies. One of the 22 schemes was as follows: Remembering that you have to be first in most marketing schemes. This was probably my most cited book in graduate school. I would highly recommend this book. I am reviewing this product to assist other consumers in making informed choices in what they buy. I am providing my honest opinion for others. Honesty is stressed for reviewers. Both positive and negative reviews are encouraged. There is no compensation or repercussions that bias my opinion. If my review was helpful, please click the Helpful button. How I rate items: 1 Star: (I hate it!!!): I would NOT recommend. 2 Stars: (I don’t like it): But, the product has some slight redeeming quality. 3 Stars: (It’s O.K.): Others may like it more than I do. 4 Stars: (I like it): Good product, but it may have some minor issues. 5 Stars: (I love it!!!): Perfect item and I will recommend it.

This book is sensational. Compact and crammed with salient philosophy. The scenarios they present make obsolete conventional marketing. Just today I read an article in WSJ that said Chevrolet truck sales are down, and they are taking shots at the leader, Ford's F-150. They used a "nifty" ad that shows concrete being dumped in each trucks bed. Silverado had barely scratched paint and a few dents, but 150 had holes punched through the floor. Conventional marketing. Completely useless! You can't change peoples minds... just about every dude I know ( and me) considers F-150 the best. It's the perception that counts. It wouldn't matter if the Silverado was better. Ford scoffed at the marketing "stunt" as well they should. 150 will stay the leader indefinitely. Why didn't Chevrolet's marketing people read this book? They could have saved a whole bunch of money by not doing this campaign. Parts of this book are so brilliant, and dense, that I found myself reading certain paragraphs several times to really grasp the concepts. I have several of the author's books, they are all excellent. The only flaw is that this book is 30 years old, so some predictions of certain businesses' prospects didn't come true. Did you ever try to change a woman's mind? Right. That's the rub. Once people think of a product or service as best, it is very difficult to change their minds down the road.

I have a very different concept behind marketing and the human experience with anything tangible which does not fully align with the book. Unless there is further development beyond this, I find it a limited and vacuumed read. Is it important to grasp? Yes. Recommend? Yes. Use? Not alone.

This is a great bool filled with timless laws for any business owner, entrepreneur or seller of services or products. This bool should be mandatory reading for anyone in any economy because you are going to have to market yourself in any industry and it is better to know the rules to avoid pitfalls and succeed. I love how the book gives you the law and how to apply it and examples od companies that succeeded in application of the law as well as those who violated it and the consequences. Thank you for helping my business to not only sustain itself but flourish through the years.

The authors wanted this books main objectives to be straight forward. They wanted to clearly list the twenty-two laws that they have come up with to help people avoid making marketing mistakes in the first place. They wanted to open up peoples minds to these marketing laws by being straight forward to their audience and relating and using examples that everyday people know. The authors clearly label each step that is used in marketing with each chapter being each law. The chapters are clear and to the point, with examples and brands that most people know. Ries and Trout may straight forward list these “22 Immutable Laws of Marketing,” but in the entire book they don’t tell you how to apply these to your own business really. This makes me think that they are just trying to market their own book, and the brands that are talked about in it. To quote the book itself, “There us no objective reality. There are no facts. There are no best products. All that exists in the world of marketing are perceptions in the minds of customers or prospect. The perception is the reality. Everything else is an illusion (“Chapter 4”).” The authors may list all of the laws they believe cannot be ignored in marketing, like the laws of leadership, exclusivity, sacrifice, hype and resources to name a few. They then break down each section naming successful and unsuccessful brands and companies that have done each of these ‘laws’ that are unchangeable. They provide a range of topics and ideas to support their reasoning. The book is clearly written for people just starting out in marketing and it goes back to the basics. It is very easy and a fast read. The book may have been written in 1993, but it still has relevant knowledge that can sometimes be over looked by marketers who repeated do the same things. The authors took something that might normally only be broken down into what is known as the “Six P’s of Marketing” and broke Marketing down into twenty-two steps. Some may say this is not needed and drug out, but I think it gives a different outlook on the topic. A quote from the book might explain the either possible love or hate of this book, “When you try to be all things to all people, you inevitably wind up in trouble (“Chapter 12”).” This book, The 22 Immutable laws of Marketing, was a simple read. I enjoyed it and I can take away several things that I did not know before about marketing. The laws might not be ground breaking, but they can be simply overlooked at times.

Great book and absolutely worth reading

Libro VITAL para los que nos dedicamos a esto. Fácil de leer, directo, con ejemplos claros y sencillos (alguno que otro anticuado, por estar escrito en los 90) pero es perfecto. Escrito en un inglés fácil de leer y además con jerga profesional en inglés que siempre va bien aprender.

Très bon livre sur le marketing, les exemples sont un peu rattrapé par les années (Oui oui microsoft a bien dépassé IBM). Ponctué d'humour. Un classique à avoir dans sa bibliothèque.

Just loved this book. Great common sense advice in a quick and easy read. As mentioned in other reviews that the companies used as examples are a little outdated, the concepts within are, I feel, even more relevant to today's marketing strategies that should be being applied, given the rise of marketing becoming more about creating something meaningful rather than trying to bulldoze people in to buying a product just because it is manufactured by an established brand or because we're told it's the next big thing which is dying out as fast as the dinosaurs did. The face of business and providing what the customer actually wants is a trend that is gathering speed, the consumer has discovered their ability to decide what works for them and put their hard earned cash in to a company that can 'speak' directly to them as individuals rather than as the faceless masses. People are tired of and also becoming savvy to the fact they are being 'sold' to. A lot of the laws break down these tactics and highlight the ever changing face of marketing and sales. There has been a revolution in the world of marketing taking place, lead by the likes of Seth Godin and Bernadette Jiwa on how to build brands, no matter how big or small, that consumers are welcoming in to their hearts and homes and this book is a great accompaniment to those authors and their ideas.

Great book to fast track marketing 101s Easy to read and full of knowledge.