On good days, Seth Godin thinks about all the progress we’re making on climate change. On bad days, he thinks about the problem of racing bibs. Though pieces of paper safety-pinned to runners’ chests seem obviously outdated, the bibs persist, highlighting how difficult it can be to change a culture for the better. And yet Seth also persists to improve the culture around marketing and work, giving hundreds of talks, writing daily blog posts, and publishing 21 best-sellers. His latest, The Song of Significance, explains why workplace culture has gotten so bad and what leaders can do to make it better.
Seth joined Tyler to discuss why direct marketing works at all, the marketing success of Trader Joe’s vs Whole Foods, why you can’t reverse engineer Taylor Swift’s success, how Seth would fix baseball, the brilliant marketing in ChatGPT’s design, the most underrated American visual artist, the problem with online education, approaching public talks as a team process, what makes him a good cook, his updated advice for aspiring young authors, how growing up in Buffalo shaped him, what he’ll work on next, and more.
Read a full transcript enhanced with helpful links, or watch the full video.
Recorded May 23rd, 2023
Other ways to connect
Tyler Cowen and Steve Davies talk Theresa May, Brexit, and Europe (Live)
Raj Chetty on Teachers, Social Mobility, and How to Find Answers to Big Questions
Garry Kasparov on AI, Chess, and the Future of Creativity
Patrick Collison has a Few Questions for Tyler (Live at Stripe)
Malcolm Gladwell Wants to Make the World Safe for Mediocrity (Live at Mason)
*The Complacent Class* with Katherine Mangu-Ward (Live at Mason)
Rabbi David Wolpe on Leadership, Religion, and Identity (Live at Sixth & I)
Chef Mark Miller on Food as the Ultimate Intellectual Exploration
Jhumpa Lahiri on Writing, Translation, and Crossing Between Cultures (Live at Mason)
Joseph Henrich on WEIRD Societies and Life Among Two Strange Tribes (Live at Mason)
Fuchsia Dunlop on Chinese Food, Culture, and Travel
Steven Pinker on Language, Reason, and the Future of Violence (Live at Mason)
Ezra Klein on Media, Politics, and Models of the World
Margalit Fox on Life, Death, and the Best Job in Journalism
Michael Orthofer on Why Fiction Matters
Cass Sunstein on Judicial Minimalism, the Supreme Court, and Star Wars (Live at Mason)
Camille Paglia on her Lifestyle of Observation (Live at Mason)
Jonathan Haidt on Morality, Politics, and Intellectual Diversity on Campus
Nate Silver on the Supreme Court and the Underrated Stat for Finding Good Food (Live at Mason)
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar on Fighting Bruce Lee, Growing Up in Harlem, and Basketball (Live at Mason)
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
Teachers Talk Radio
LifeBlood
Navigating Life After 40
The Jordan B. Peterson Podcast
The Mel Robbins Podcast