Inbound Marketing: Get Found Using Google, Social Media, and Blogs by Brian Halligan and Dharmesh Shah, A review by Susan Hittner

I selected this book as the subject of my review for two reasons. The first is to learn more about the different aspects of social media and why it is a successful medium for so many businesses today. I also want to assist a not-for-profit girls' volleyball club expand their brand exposure and reach.

The book is a how to guide to getting noticed on the web. It covers the inbound marketing concept, changes in the marketing field and differences from traditional marketing methods. The intended audience is business owners who have little to no access to commercial marketing companies and large marketing budgets.

The strength for the book is the way in which it is set up. It divides the process into for parts:

Part One: Inbound Marketing - Chapters 1-3 cover the "why" of inbound marketing, with topics like "Shopping Has Changed...Has Your Marketing?"

Part Two: Get Found by Prospects - Chapters 4-7 cover more of the "how" or tactics of the process, such as the different sites within the social media network like Google, Blogs, facebook, and LinkedIn to name a few.

Part Three: Converting Customers - Chapters 8-10 focus on different ways to pull customers in to your site and coverting visitors into leads. It also includes common mistakes to avoid and the advantages of experimentation.

Part Four: Make Better Decisions - Chapters 11-16 provide additional detail to analyzing results of your social media marketing campaigns. It also leads into next steps for your marketing and business growth.

Throughout the book, the authors provide checklist called "To Do" at the end of each cahpter. This provides a step-by-step process for a business owner to follow. The book also provides an entire section devoted to tools, resources and tips for startups.

At times the books goes into deeper technical explanations. For a small business owner, this may be a little intimidating. Many business found on the web may, or may not, have a technical resource with which they could discuss these ideas to explore the plausibility of a campaign or idea.

I believe this book is a step above Social Marketing for Dummies in complexity. It was written in the same vein as The New Rules of Marketing and PR by David Meerman Scott. Inbound Marketing is the first book in the series "The New Rules of Social Media".

I would highly recommend the book to anyone interest in this area. It is full of ideas, checklists, details, and interesting, real-world examples for each topic. I learned much from this book and am actively applying (albeit slowly), it to the fan page on facebook for the organization I mentioned earlier.

This page can be viewed at: http://www.facebook.com/#!/group.php?gid=277102765472