Marketing Books Worth a Look: Some of Our Favorite Marketing Books Written by Women

Women make up half of the world’s population – but no longer account for half of all marketing professionals. 

Women’s participation in our industry, once a steady 50%, still lags 13% behind pre-pandemic numbers, according to She Runs It’s #Inclusive100 study on diversity and inclusion in marketing, media and adtech. The Drum’s Kendra Barnett had this to say about the report: “Data evidenced a slow-moving but encouraging increase in representation across different backgrounds, but hinted at an industry in turmoil, with low rates of equitable promotion and a sweeping exodus of women from the workforce.”

The underrepresentation of women’s voices – especially women of color – has a negative impact on the pipeline to the C-suite, with women disproportionately absent at the highest levels of business. 

We believe our industry can – and should – do better. That’s why we are taking this moment to amplify the voices of women authors. Read on to hear what women are saying about current and enduring business topics, from winning marketing techniques to how our personal struggles and triumphs give us the skills we need to become exceptional leaders. 

16 Marketing and Business Books Everyone Should Read 

1. High-Impact Content Marketing: Strategies to Make Your Content Intentional, Engaging and Effective by Purna Virji

This book is designed to help marketers craft content that is engaging, compelling and strategically aligned with business goals. Virji emphasizes the importance of intentionality in content creation, guiding readers through techniques to ensure their content resonates with their target audience and drives measurable results. This book is a must-read for anyone looking to elevate their content marketing strategy and achieve greater impact.

2.  Using Behavioral Science in Marketing: Drive Customer Action and Loyalty by Prompting Instinctive Responses by Nancy Harhut

Harhut's book leverages the power of behavioral science to revolutionize marketing strategies. She advises marketers on how to design messages that tap into the instinctive responses of their customers. This book is perfect for marketers who wish to better understand the intricacies of customer behavior to enhance their marketing efforts.

3.  Forget the Funnel: A Customer-Led Approach for Driving Predictable, Recurring Revenue by Georgiana Laudi and Claire Suellentrop 

As a challenge to traditional marketing models, this book introduces a customer-led approach prioritizing the needs and experiences of the customer at every stage of the buyer journey. Forget the Funnel is a game-changer for marketers and business leaders seeking to build a sustainable growth model based on customer satisfaction and loyalty.

4. The Urgent Life: My Story of Love, Loss, and Survival by Bozoma Saint John

Through her story of love, loss and survival, Saint John helps readers gain insights into the resilience and determination required to succeed in both life and business. This memoir is a powerful testament to the strength of the human spirit and will be valuable for anyone facing deep uncertainty and adversity.

5. Everyday Business Storytelling: Create, Simplify, and Adapt A Visual Narrative for Any Audience by Janine Kurnoff and Lee Lazarus 

Authors Kurnoff and Lazarus guide readers through the process of developing clear and meaningful stories within their business communications. Offering a framework for readers to follow, this book outlines a process for placing the vital data of business within a relatable narrative that humanizes the content and connects with audiences. 

2. Customer Insight Strategies: How to Understand Your Audience and Create Remarkable Marketing by Dr. Christine Bailey

Dr. Bailey offers strategies and techniques on how to use customer insights to craft winning marketing strategies. With a voice that doesn’t get bogged down in tech speak, she explains her top customer insight strategies and how they can be applied to crafting and improving marketing campaigns. Featuring interviews from leading marketing professionals, this book is a reliable go-to for anyone interested in taking a deep dive into the link between data analytics and marketing. 

7. Cultures of Belonging: Building Inclusive Organizations that Last by Alida Miranda-Wolff 

DEI expert Miranda-Wolff has created a guidebook for how to turn your organization into one that prioritizes diversity, equity and inclusion. Filled with advice and action steps, this book takes readers through the process of building a culture of inclusion that not only makes room for a diversity of perspectives, experiences and backgrounds, but recognizes the importance of strong DEI for workforce happiness and retention. 

8. The Three Chairs: How Great Leaders Drive Communication, Performance, and Engagement by Dr. Karyn Gordon

Dr. Gordon has spent over 20 years teaching more than half a million people what it takes to develop enduring leadership skills. This book explores the way top leaders inspire performance, engagement and communication within their workforce, leading to greater productivity and employee retention. These skills aren’t just for those who are already in leadership positions – anyone who wishes to have a positive and lasting impact on those around them will benefit from reading this book.

9. Why Design Matters: Conversations with the World's Most Creative People by Debbie Millman

With 15 years of the Design Matters podcast under her belt, Millman has curated a compilation of her top 80 interviews with thought leaders and storytellers from the creative world. This is a behind-the-scenes look at the journeys, successes and struggles behind some of the most notable marketing and creative work of our time. 

10. Get Your Career in SHAPE: A Five-Step Guide to Achieve the Success You Need, Want, and Deserve by Dr. Candace Steele Flippin

Featured in our 35 inspirational Black women in marketing post, communications executive Dr. Steele Flippin shares her framework for professional success in this book aimed at helping more women fulfill their professional potential and attain leadership roles. Derived from personal experience and her research conducted at the Weatherhead School of Management community at Case Western Reserve University, the SHAPE career framework promises to be a game-changer for women in all areas of business.

11. Influence Is Your Superpower: The Science of Winning Hearts, Sparking Change, and Making Good Things Happen by Zoe Chance

A behavioral scientist and professor at the Yale School of Management, Chance leads readers on a rediscovery of their natural-born powers of influence. As a challenge to the conditioning we all face as we grow, this book encourages the examination of behaviors that both encourage and diminish influence. This book promises to be transformative for anyone who feels they have lost touch with their innate power to influence.

12. Did That Just Happen?! Beyond “Diversity” ― Creating Sustainable and Inclusive Organizations by Dr. Stephanie Pinder-Amaker and Dr. Lauren Wadsworth

Taking the diversity conversation out of the theoretical space and grounding it with real-life accounts, Drs. Pinder-Amaker and Wadsworth set out to help readers affect real, equitable change in their professional and personal lives. This book is will hit home for anyone who holds a leadership or management position, or holds a position of influence in driving organizational culture.

13. Conviction Marketing by Kelly Roach

This book is for anyone interested in attaining marketing success by becoming a thought leader in their industry. Roach offers a roadmap that helps marketers and entrepreneurs craft authentic brands, use the voice of authority to stand out on social media, and connect with the right clients through messaging that stays true to who they are.

14. Level Up: Rise Above the Hidden Forces Holding Your Business Back Hardcover by Stacey Abrams, Lara Hodgson, with Heather Cabot

The story of Abrams and Hodgson’s entrepreneurial success is finally being told by the dynamic duo themselves. This book follows the two as they revisit their highs and lows, and explores what it takes to grow a small business past that threshold of “small” into a business that goes toe-to-toe with industry giants.

15. The Launch: A Product Marketer's Guide: 50 key questions & lessons for a successful launch by Yasmeen Turayhi

Both product development and product marketing should be answering the question: What do consumers want? Still, this is not always the case. Turayhi explores the missing link between development and launch, and answers 50 key questions that will help your go-to-market strategy sell a product that is exactly what customers are looking for.

16. Loved: How to Rethink Marketing for Tech Products by Martina Lauchengco

Marketing in the tech industry has evolved over the years as technology moved from the realm of necessity to that of leisure. Drawing from her own experience marketing for organizations like Microsoft and Netscape, as well as dozens of interviews with tech marketing leaders, Lauchengco explores the elements of a powerful tech marketing strategy.

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