Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Amazon

I did ask my friend Glen if he’d made his purchases, and he hadn’t. Hmm. I still don’t know if my roommate did her Christmas shopping on Wednesday. She comes from a family of 11, so it may have been all her doing. But other than that...I don’t know. As of today (or right now, anyway) I’m back up, to 60,000. How long I last at 60,000, I don’t know, but I’m grateful to be there now.

Another “push” is underway—this one involving emails to everyone who has a large email list. For the past year or so, every time I got a mass email, I noted whether or not the person was sending it to a ton of people. (“A ton” is hereby defined as “more than twenty.”) For a while I was actually recording all of those addresses, with the thought that I would send out a notification to all of them, but then I realized the line between advertising to friends of friends and spam is very thin indeed, unless I happen to say “I’m also a friend of Andrea’s,” in which case they will write angry notes to Andrea and say, “Why are you giving out my email address to spammers?” (Yes, this is a shout-out to Andrea, my first official fan; by “official” I mean “actually subscribed to my blog!”) So I’m sending requests to these friends and asking them to spam their own friends. Spamming your friends isn’t considered spam, unless you’re sending out a “Send this to 12 people and your entire life will change!” note. That is definitely spam, regardless of the sender.

So I’ve been not-spamming my friends and asking them to not-spam their friends, and one of my alumni lists sent out a notice also. And lo and behold, this might actually be working.

So...thanks to the people who have put me in the five digits! Now let’s shoot for four....

7 comments:

Andrea said...

Ha, thank you for the shout-out! I sent the message on blind carbon copy to avoid seeming too spammy, but I think I sent it to like 106 people! So, sheesh, I guess I do fall in the category of someone with a lot of contacts...

I figure if I ever manage to write and publish a book myself (which is one of those life goals that is sitting on the shelf for now, maybe I need angels of my own), you can return the favor.

Several people have expressed interest, but I don't know if anyone else has ordered yet. My copy arrived last week while I was out of town -- haven't had a chance to start reading yet, but soon!!

Andrea said...

Oh, no wait, I thought of about 50 more people I sent it to via a couple of knitting yahoo groups I am a member of, though there is certainly some overlap in there with people I'd already sent it to. Oh, wait, and I blogged you too. Do I win a prize? Maybe I missed my calling as publicist. ;)

Kathryn Maughan said...

My own in-house publicist! I may be doing some events in Utah in March or so...now I know whom to call! thank you!!

Kathryn Maughan said...

And by the way, let anyone who expresses interest know...it's a great and easy Christmas present!!

Andrea said...

I was just thinking this morning that someone (maybe me? maybe you?) should contact the Weber County Library system and get your book to be a featured title for them. They probably have displays featuring home-grown authors, if I remember right!

Kathryn Maughan said...

ah ha, I'm ahead of you there. I have contacted both Weber County and Salt Lake County systems and sent them free copies.

Andrea said...

Just to report in, I gave a copy of your book for our office Christmas gift exchange, and the lady who got it was so excited, because she'd started reading your excerpts on your webpage when I sent the link out, and she wanted to know the rest of the story!