I like to send books to my clients — books I’ve read and think they’ll get something from. A client who recently received a book asked me how many books I read last year during the Pandemic of 2020. So I counted…
Last year I read/re-read 46 business books and 15 non-biz books. Not included here are all the magazines, journals and digests.
At the bottom of this post is some of the things I do to help retain/use the knowledge.
If you’re looking to up your business, marketing, finance, productivity knowledge, here’s a peek at 2020’s reading list by category (note that many of these could fall into more than one category):
Finance-Related Books
- Profit First: Transform Your Business from a Cash-Eating Monster to a Money-Making Machine by Mike Michalowicz — a favorite that I re-read every few years and describes how we manage the money at TMW.
- Simple Numbers 2.0 – Rules for Smart Scaling: A Play by Play Analysis for Pure Growth by Greg Crabtree — the “part 2” to Simple Numbers, Straight Talk, Big Profits!: 4 Keys to Unlock Your Business Potential. Definitely want to read the first one first and not get this book on audio (several charts to digest).
- The Intelligent Investor, Rev. Ed by Benjamin Graham
Customer Service, Customer Experience, Customer Retention-Related Books
- The Endangered Customer: 8 Steps to Guarantee Repeat Business by Richard R. Shapiro
- Iconic: How Organizations and Leaders Attain, Sustain, and Regain the Ultimate Level of Distinction by Scott McKain
- Create Distinction: What to Do When ”Great” Isn’t Good Enough to Grow Your Business by Scott McKain
- Giftology: The Art and Science of Using Gifts to Cut Through the Noise, Increase Referrals, and Strengthen Client Retention by John Ruhlin
- Digging Wells and Building Fences: Discover the Steps to Combat Showrooming, Converge Physical & Digital Retailing, and Create Customers for Life by Scott McKain
- The Automatic Customer: Creating a Subscription Business in Any Industry by John Warrillow
- The Convenience Revolution: How to Deliver a Customer Service Experience that Disrupts the Competition and Creates Fierce Loyalty by Shep Hyken
- Customer Loyalty: How to Earn It, How to Keep It by Jill Griffin and Robert Herres
- Bluefishing: The Art of Making Things Happen by Steve Sims
- Customer Winback: How to Recapture Lost Customers–And Keep Them Loyal by Jill Griffin and Michael Lowenstein
Marketing and Sales-Related Books
- Marketing Made Simple: A Step-by-Step StoryBrand Guide for Any Business by Donald Miller
- Your First 1000 Copies: The Step-by-Step Guide to Marketing Your Book (2nd Edition) by Tim Grahl — some great tips in here and yep, getting ready for book promo!
- Building a StoryBrand: Clarify Your Message So Customers Will Listen by Donald Miller — an annual re-read to keep me focused on messaging.
- No B.S. Guide to Powerful Presentations: The Ultimate No Holds Barred Plan to Sell Anything with Webinars, Online Media, Speeches, and Seminars by Dan Kennedy and Dustin Mathews
- The Brain Audit: Why Customers Buy (And Why They Don’t) by Sean D’Souza
- Overdeliver: Build a Business for a Lifetime Playing the Long Game in Direct Response Marketing by Brian Kurtz
- The Clarity Project: The 4-step system to simplifying your sales message and attracting more clients online by Liam Thompson
Productivity Books
- Stretch: Unlock the Power of Less – and Achieve More Than You Ever Imagined by Scott Sonenshein
- Own the Day, Own Your Life: Optimized Practices for Waking, Working, Learning, Eating, Training, Playing, Sleeping, and Sex by Aubrey Marcus
- The Five-Hour Workday: Live Differently, Unlock Productivity, and Find Happiness by Stephan Aarstol
- The Perfect Day Formula: How to Own the Day and Control Your Life by Craig Ballantyne
- The Perfect Week Formula: Build Your Business Around Your Life, Not Your Life Around Your Business by Craig Ballantyne
- Elevate: Push Beyond Your Limits and Unlock Success in Yourself and Others by Robert Glazer
General Business and/or Personal Development-Related Books
- Fix This Next: Make the Vital Change That Will Level Up Your Business by Mike Michalowicz — loved this one so much that I became certified as a Fix This Next Advisor.
- Upstream: The Quest to Solve Problems Before They Happen by Dan Heath
- White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism by Robin D’Angelo
- Super Human: The Bulletproof Plan to Age Backward and Maybe Even Live Forever by Dave Asprey
- How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi
- The Outsiders: Eight Unconventional CEOs and Their Radically Rational Blueprint for Success by William Thorndike
- Surge: Time the Marketplace, Ride the Wave of Consumer Demand, and Become Your Industry’s Big Kahuna by Mike Michalowicz
- Success is Your Own Damn Fault by Larry Winget — warning, Kindle version of this one has so many typos it was distracting to read.
- Between the World and Me by Ta’Nehisi Coates
- Failing Up: How to Take Risks, Aim Higher, and Never Stop Learning by Leslie Odom Jr.
- Attention!: The power of simple decisions in a distracted world by Rob Hatch
- Dream Big: Know What You Want, Why You Want It, and What You’re Going to Do About It by Bob Goff
- Sweetspot: How to spend more time doing what you love, are great at, and adds most value by Andy Clayton
- Beyond Great: Nine Strategies for Thriving in an Era of Social Tension, Economic Nationalism, and Technological Revolution by Arindam Bhattacharya
- The Disruption Mindset: Why Some Organizations Transform While Others Fail by Charlene Li
- Renegade Millionaire: 7 Secrets To Extreme Wealth, Autonomy, And Entrepreneurial Success by Dan Kennedy and Lee Milteer
- The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life by Mark Manson
- Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It by Chris Voss
- Love-Based Mission: How to Create a Business That Serves Your Soul (Love-Based Business) by Therese Skelly
- Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones by James Clear — another re-read
And the non-biz books (some can be considered personal development while others are just for fun):
- The Cancer Code: A Revolutionary New Understanding of a Medical Mystery by Dr. Jason Fung
- Super Human: The Bulletproof Plan to Age Backward and Maybe Even Live Forever by Dave Asprey
- Less is More: How Degrowth Will Save the World by Jason Hickel
- The Longevity Diet: Discover the New Science Behind Stem Cell Activation and Regeneration to Slow Aging, Fight Disease, and Optimize Weight by Valter Longo
- How God Changes Your Brain: Breakthrough Findings from a Leading Neuroscientist by Andrew Newberg MD
- All the Devils Are Here: A Novel (Chief Inspector Gamache Novel) by Louise Penny — I LOVED her earlier Inspector Gamache novels, the later ones are darker. This one is a return to the style I prefer.
- How Not to Diet: The Groundbreaking Science of Healthy, Permanent Weight Loss by Michael Greger
- Old Bones (Nora Kelly, 1) by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child
- Crooked River (Agent Pendergast series) by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child — I’ve read every book in the series, one of the cleverest mystery series I’ve read.
- Eat to Beat Disease: The New Science of How Your Body Can Heal Itself by William Li, M.D.
- The Ice Limit by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child– great story of an amazing engineering feat combined with what makes people tick.
- Beyond the Ice Limit: A Gideon Crew Novel (Gideon Crew Series Book 4) by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child — a sequel (although can stand on its own) to The Ice Limit above that came out 16 years after the first.
- The Codex by Douglas Preston
- The Cafe on the Edge of the World: A Story About the Meaning of Life by John Strelecky
- Deep Storm by Lincoln Child
How I get the most out of what I read
It’s easy to read and forget when dealing with everything in life and business so I’ve developed a few strategies to support me in retaining and implementing the info I read:
1. Business on Kindle, Non-Biz on Paper
While I prefer to hold a book in my hands (there’s nothing like that!), when it comes to learning I’ve discovered that using my Kindle works much better. Highlighting passages I’m interested in allows me to come back and zip through much faster than a paper copy. I can also export things to my Evernote Notebooks and sort by topic.
I save the non-business books for paper copies, most of which I get from the library to ease my mind over the “dead tree books.” 🙂
2. Read with a Notepad Nearby
I typically have my Whitelines notebook nearby (Whitelines lets you digitize handwritten notes so I can upload them when done and store with highlighted notes from book.) and jot any special notes and/or action steps that aren’t covered simply by highlighting.
When done reading and before uploading, I go through my notes and take any item marked with an asterisk and either add it to my action list or delegate it to a team member. This is something to be implemented.
Each week I review my overall action list and move items to that week’s “Make It Happen” list and schedule it on a certain day. This saves me from always staring at a multi-page list which feels overwhelming.
That’s it… doing these two things have helped me make leaps in my business and share knowledge/support clients in doing the same in theirs.