All Marketers are Liars: The Underground Classic That Explains How Marketing Really Works--and Why Authenticity Is the Best Marketing of All

by Seth Godin

Everyone is a liar. We tell ourselves stories because we’re superstitious. Stories are shortcuts we use because we’re too overwhelmed by data to discover all the details. The stories we tell ourselves are lies that make it far easier to live in a very complicated world.

Marketers profit because consumers buy what they want, not what they need. Needs are practical and objective, wants are irrational and subjective. And no matter what you sell—and whether you sell it to businesses or consumers—the path to profitable growth is in satisfying wants, not needs.

Truly great stories succeed because they are able to capture the imagination of large or important audiences. A great story is true. Not true because it’s factual, but true because it’s consistent and authentic.

If you need to water down your story to appeal to everyone, it will appeal to no one.

And most of all, great stories agree with our worldview. The best stories don’t teach people anything new. Instead, the best stories agree with what the audience already believes and makes the members of the audience feel smart and secure when reminded how right they were in the first place.

There’s no question that consumers (and voters and nations, and so on) are complicit in this storytelling process. No marketer can get a person to do something without his active participation.