When I finished the manuscript for The Zen of MLM late last year, the very next thing I did was write to marketing superstar Seth Godin to see if he would take a look at it. Seth and I had never spoken, and I had only the most tenuous connection. (Networking Times once did an interview with him—although it was not me who did the interview.)

Seth Godin, if you are not familiar with the name, is widely hailed as one of the most brilliant marketers alive. Business Week called him “the ultimate entrepreneur for the Information Age.” His Permission Marketing (1999) was very influential in network marketing circles. A fw weeks ago his latest book, The Dip, hit #5 on the New York Times hardcover advice bestseller list. (You’ll notice, I have his blog on this site’s blogroll. That’s how highly I think of his writing.)

Seth is also considered by some as being not so big a fan of network marketing. I wasn’t sure how he’d greet my book—or if he’d greet it at all. After all, he’s a famous and busy guy.

Six weeks later he wrote back with an endorsement—and what he said was so wonderful, indeed, that I put it on the book’s front cover. In fact, its twenty-four words comprise the only endorsement that appears anywhere on or in the book. . .

But not on the book’s web site. One of Seth’s standard endorsement conditions is that his quote not be used on the Internet, just on the actual book—which is why you won’t find his quote anywhere online (here included). If you want to see what he said, you’ll have to get a copy of the book!

P.S. I thought Seth’s quote was just about the nicest things anyone had ever said about my writing . . . until today, when he topped it. I’m about to publish another book (coauthored with my friend Bob Burg), this one with Portfolio (who happens to also be Seth’s publisher)—and he just sent me an enthusiastic endorsement for that book, too! With the same condition—sorry, can’t quote it here. What I can tell you is the title of the book: The Go-Giver.