For a while I’ve wanted to start a category dedicated to book reviews, but I just haven’t gotten around to it. But now I’ve been motivated by an incentive: Chris Garrett, the author of Killer Flagship Content (I can’t link to it because you can only read it if you subscribe to his blog), is a top-tier blogger who has offered a link back to the site of anyone who reviews his book, plus an early preview of his next ebook. So I can win three times here: I finally get going on the book reviews, I get a link to my blog from a big-time guy (which is worth gold in the blogging world, for those of you who aren’t familiar with blog currency), and I get to preview another book, which is pretty exciting for a book lover like me.
Killer Flagship Content brings an interesting premise, which can be applied to more than just blogging: the value of flagship content, or flagship anything. The idea is that if you create something that brings great value to others, people will always return to your site/blog/store/school. Garrett doesn’t expand the idea that far in this ebook, and only concentrates on the value of flagship content on the Internet.
According to Garrett, flagship content is “so compelling it draws visitors like a magnet,” and is “about long term value.” He goes through the reasons why someone would want to create such valuable content, how to go about doing it, and how to create content that people perceive as valuable. He’s talking about creating a report, white paper, or ebook (ahem) that gives value to readers.
[With this ebook, Chris is doing the old reflexive thing which is like looking at your reflection in a mirror in a mirror: the book itself is a great example of killer flagship content. It’s as if you don’t even have to read it, you can just look at it and get the message.]
The ebook is an interesting read, since I’ve never before come across a text that totally focuses on the idea of creating specific pieces of valuable content. It also emphasizes that we are living in an era where information holds great value, and those who can provide valuable content will be those that succeed.
There are two things that bothered me about this book:
- It needs MAJOR editing! I know my threshold is probably lower than that of others since my profession revolves around English content, but it’s hard to read through this book when you keep getting jolted by misspelled words, missing punctuation, and grammatical errors. This is a good piece of work, and I think Chris should give it the respect it deserves and polish it up. Interestingly, his blog entries are basically error-free. So why did he ignore the book? (Seth Godin’s ebooks almost never have writing errors. And he could probably make mistakes and people would still read his stuff.)
- Why does everyone have to call everything “Killer“? There are so many Killer guides, and Killerest tips and tricks, and I can never get used to that word. It’s just so dramatic. It’s too self-assured. I guess it works, but it just screams “I’ve read the statistics and I know that if I use the word Killer, then everyone will read my manifesto on “10 Killer Steps to Better Underwater Basket Weaving.”
So Chris, here’s your review. Good job. Just start dotting your i’s and crossing your t’s, kay?
