BOOK: Online Marketing A User's Manual by Murray Newlands

This book is deceptive.

It looks like a fairly brief (218 pages) hardback book, the kind where the world expert tells you about strategy, and you have to know a lot about the subject to make use of what they say.

I know a bit about facebook and youtube and twitter and marketing in general. I had no idea there is so much more to know. What's more, Newlands presents it in an incredible way - so many things to think about, and the way he presents it, it is so straightforward to think about these things.

It kicks off with the familiar - how exactly do you establish a presence in Social Networking sites? Seems straightforward; then Murray hits you with "what impression do you want to create?". Hmm, I should definitely have thought of this before I started. I am, yes, going to unpick my existing social media presence and redo it. Not because Murray said I should, but because it's obvious, when you stop to think about it!

Chapters (after Social Media) include Digital Branding, Company Web Sites, Blogging, Online PR (and why it is different from offline PR - it moves so much faster and you can discover opinion and respond to it), Video marketing, SEO, and three more. Each is presented in a very clear fashion, suitable for a complete novice, yet also completely accessible to a half-expert like me. The endorsements say it's also suitable for a real expert.

What really stands out?

Each chapter includes an Introduction, a brief explanation and how-to guide ("the basics") which means you can plan before you commit your first attempt to the public eye, a section on "the future" which really helps you understand how fast everything changes and how you need to keep an eye on your online presence, and concludes with a run through the Tools which you WILL need to make sure that you deliver an online presence to the best effect.

This is a book for marketing departments who want to understand what they buy from digital marketing companies. It's a book for companies that do it themselves, and even for companies that sell digital marketing as a product (yes it is that good - not to base your whole business on, but to make sure you understand everything before choosing where to specialise). For me, it's a book for small consultancies and individuals who have to do this for themselves, and want to do it well.