1qtr2008 - Book Review – You, Inc.

Title: You, Inc. – The Art of Selling Yourself
Authors: Harry Beckwith and Christine Clifford Beckwith
ISBN-13: 9780446578219

I was very eager to read this, the latest book by marketing guru Harry Beckwith. After all, his “Selling the Invisible” was an indispensable resource for me as I starting building my business way back when. So when I found it while browsing in an airport bookstore one evening, I immediately grabbed it and headed toward the checkout counter.

So while I found much of its content to be quite excellent (more on that in a moment) I didn’t really care for how it was written. It felt like two separate books, actually – one written by Harry and one written by Christine – that somehow got randomly shuffled together into one. Don’t get me wrong; they each shared some wonderful stories, vignettes and lessons learned. But it felt quite disjointed to not know whose lessons learned I was reading about at any point in time – especially in the first few sections of the book. I don’t know why it was so distracting to me, but it really was.

Okay, that said, on to some of nuggets about the art of selling yourself that I highlighted while reading:

1. The first thing to sell is ... yourself.
2. The future belongs to the Communicators.
3. Ambiguity is expensive.
4. To improve your writing, read what you write aloud and revise before sending or submitting.
5. “A poor teacher describes; a good teacher explains; an excellent teacher demonstrates; a great teacher inspires.”
6. How to give an excellent thirty-minute speech: Speak for twenty-two minutes.
7. Life is not what you make it. It is how you take it.
8. How many thank-you notes did you send last year? This year, send twice that many.
9. Follow up within a day.
10. The greatest gift you can offer is your time.
11. The greatest compliment you can pay is: “I understand something deep in your heart.”
12. Give your all.
13. Keep learning.
14. Always do right.
15. Be vivid.
16. Don’t just be brief; be briefer.

Good stuff to be sure. But I really wanted to like this book more than I did. Amidst some truly helpful tips and tricks, I found it bloated with more than its share of platitudes and filler. I mean were two chapters really necessary for tips on attire, when one advised us to “buy one great suit,” and another was needed to simply add “and one pair of great shoes”?!

You, Inc. is billed as “The Definitive Guide to Career and Personal Success.” And maybe it is. Thirty reviewers on Amazon.com thought enough about it to give an average rating of 4½ stars (out of 5) – and more than half of them gave it a full 5-out-of-5 star rating!

I don’t know about that, though. I mean I did learn some things – and if you read it you will too. But, on balance, the Harry Beckwith book I’m far more comfortable recommending is his Selling the Invisible.

Surely I could go on about You, Inc., but I want to honor that last nugget I learned from it!