Customer Reviews

The Small Town Advertising Handbook: How To Say More And Spend Less

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Living in a "small town", and promoting my business on a "limited budget", Tom's book provides me with the insights, tools, and strategies I am putting to good use to grow my busines, as quickly as possible, with the minimum of expense. Tom's style is to the point, easy to understand, and offers several step by step instructions. What I like the most about Tom's book, is that I feel it is not necessary to read it from front to back before I will benefit. I feel that I can start reading Tom's book at any point, even reading chapters randomly, to obtain the specific information I need at that time.

Tom Egelhoff has captured the nuts and bolts of advertising in "The Small Town Advertising Handbook: How to Say More & Spend Less!" I couldn't put the book down until I finished it. And don't limit yourself by thinking this book is only for small towns. The principles and concepts of advertising are the same, and this is a wonderful reference book!

I should've known better than to buy a book that has been reviewed twice in 5 years. Live and learn. All that glitters is not gold, and the reviews for this book are no exception. Basically, the author has found clever ways to re-hash some very simple principles that anyone with even a modest business background, will have heard many times. Know your customers, key your ads, call to action, emotion not logic, etc.

My biggest issue with the book however, is that the author often doesn't answer most of the questions he poses in each section. He gives you things to think about, but offers few concrete suggestions or courses of action for ANY of his lines of questioning. In short, he doesn't have any magic answers, even as case-studies or examples. The book would've been much better if it followed a format similar to "Here are 5 questions to ask yourself about your target market (or about your new ad headline)... and here's an example of how I would handle this situation if I owned a pizza shop or an financial consulting company in your small town." But he never does that. Also many of the examples cited are very tired, old-school examples. Apple vs. Windows. VHS vs. Beta. YAWN. Tell me something I don't know / haven't heard 300 times since marketing 101 in college, please.

Basically, he pads and re-pads the book with the same 4 or 5 points over and over. But it's not as if the mantras themselves are ingenious or thought-provoking. They're college text material. The bottom line is this book is short on useful content, especially when you consider the very small format and wide margins used. This book could be condensed to about 100 pages or less IMO, and sold for less than $10.