Which is better? A blog mention or a quote in a magazine article? If you said the magazine quote, you need to read The New Rules of Marketing and PR.

Back in the old days, we hired agencies to create ads and PR firms to generate buzz. We used interrupt marketing. We communicated a simple message broadly. And measured results in the single digits; a campaign that generated 1% response was considered a success.

We’ve felt it for a long time: the old rules of marketing don’t work.

David Meerman Scott introduces the new world of product marketing using new tools to direct-cast to those who are most interested: our buyers. Nowadays anyone with a Mac and a mic can create a podcast; anyone with a video camera can post on YouTube. And sending a news release to Google is now much more important than sending a news release to a journalist.

In the new world of marketing, having something to say matters more than ever. This book explains the reasons why the new media works and how to use the new rules. As always, marketers need to understand the product and its value to buyers, and also be able to articulate the value in buyer language. We just can’t continue to offer vague product platitudes and expect to get anyone’s attention. “Everyone everywhere” is no longer a valid market segment (and it never was)!

But perhaps the most important use for the book is to convince your management that blogging is better than advertising, that posting news to your web site is better than posting to prnewswire, and that participating in a small but interested community is better than blasting your message to everyone everywhere, hoping that someone will hear you.

The really interesting part of this book is that it reminds us that the old techniques really didn’t work very well either. While the others spout jargon at you and vie to shout over each other, the new rules of marketing are a quiet conversation, using language both parties understand.