• Ad Age, Tuesday, November 27, 2007 11:15 AM

Seth Godin is the top marketing guru to an elite group of marketing executives, followed by Apple's Steve Jobs. The Marketing Executives Networking Group anointed Godin in a survey responded to by more than 600 of the group's 1,657 members. The study queried members about a host of other topics, including key demographic groups (baby boomers) and best business books ("Good to Great" by Jim Collins).

The top buzzwords for the group are traditional concepts, such as segmentation, brand loyalty and competitive intelligence, followed closely by new-school media tactics, including search-engine optimization, data mining and personalization. Green marketing was the most popular write-in buzzword, while the least-popular concepts--named by fewer than 40%--were Six Sigma, game theory and faith-based marketing.

Anderson Analytics surveyed the group. Membership is by invitation only. More than 80% of members are senior executives, C-level executives or company owners.

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