Book Review: Tribes by Seth Godin

Seth Godin is the most popular business blogger in the world. He has authored several books, one in particular, The Dip, was a New York Times bestseller. His books have been translated into more than 25 languages. He is the founder and CEO of the social network Squidoo.com. Seth Godin is a real leader and up until a few weeks ago I had never heard of him. Sure, I had heard about Squidoo.com a few times within the past two years or so, but after looking at the social networking site I dismissed it almost immediately, as did a great deal of social media strategists. However, when someone is a true leader they are not going to reach each and every single person instantly; it takes time to build a fan base and eventually, when you create or come up with an idea that appeals to people in their own, personal lives, your fan base will continue to grow well after your book hits the New York Times best seller list.

Tribes was recommended to me by a business colleague of mine and the day I heard about it and about how inspired and motivated it made her feel after reading it, I ordered it that same day. After a mere to days I, just like my colleague, felt an immense sense of motivation to continue on the path I have been paving for myself in my business and also, I felt the validation that home-based business people sometimes need in order to keep doing what they’re doing. When people start to think outside of the box and start to initiate radical change within any field, those people are often greeted not with the support that they deserve for being creative and industrialist minds from the people around them, most often they are greeted with criticism that emerges from people when they think that the ideas of others are worthless or won’t work or are too obscure and out of the box. It is these people who often stop the people with remarkable and out of the box ideas. As Godin pointed out in the book, people are not afraid that their ideas are worthless or won’t work, they are not afraid of the so-called unknown of their future; they are afraid of the criticism they will receive from the people who doubt them.

Tribes is not laid out like your standard usually boring business book; it is more fluid and laid out in chunky prose. It is to the point, highlighting an assortment of advice, admonitions, case studies, experiments, quotations and anecdotal stories. It gives you snippets of absolutely remarkable achievements of people who have proved to be true leaders and in Godin’s terms, they are leading a tribe of people who all see one person (the leader) doing something right, something that inspires, motivates and resonates with them and they begin to follow that person and support that person in whichever way they deem appropriate.

Tribes successfully reveals the entrepreneurial mindset and what is needed in order to succeed in a market that is against you; determination, motivation and the positivity that you can truly and successfully build your ideas into something remarkable. It includes case studies and short stories about people who have truly made an impact on social networks like Twitter and how the amount of people they reach with social networks is impressive, but in actuality, they had built that tribe of people throughout the past months and even years.

If you are an entrepreneur of any kind, a blogger, a person with a different take on something or a new, completely radical idea that you think no one believes in or could believe in, I could not recommend a better book to get you thinking and feeling like the leader you know deep down that you truly are.