Erin Mitchell
It’s been an odd day. Just as I was about to post this, a little tempest in a teapot broke loose over on The Twitters concerning FridayReads. I’m going to address said tempest here because there’s a relevant marketing lesson in it somewhere…and I’m hoping you’ll indulge me in discussing it a bit.
In case you missed it: FridayReads is a hashtag (on Twitter) and a Facebook page. Every Friday, people share whatever they’re reading. Simple. The point is that the more people who admit to reading, the cooler reading becomes. The more books are “out there” to be discovered. Celebrating and encouraging reading makes the world a better place,
Yes, I really believe that.
Over the last year and a half or so, I’ve devoted a lot of time and energy to FridayReads. In that time, I’ve seen it grow from a few hundred people participating to a few thousand, to close to 7,000. As I write this, the Facebook page has 9,232 members. It was only about a year ago that I was asking my friends and family to “like” it so it could have 25 people, the magic number to be able to get a clean Facebook URL (without that annoying long string of numbers). I also work with Ian Lewis on understanding what info we can glean from the thousands of tweets and posts and how we can use that data to further encourage yet more reading.
Is my time valuable? Yes, it is. Do I donate it freely to this effort? Yes, I do. I have never been paid one cent—red or otherwise—for anything I’ve done with FridayReads. I do it because I believe that it is a way to share my love of reading. No more, no less. And I’m not alone; there’s a group of folks who have invested a lot of their time and energy into FridayReads simply because they believe in the enduring value of reading.
Today, some folks got in a conniption because they discovered that some people, three, to be exact, do make money on FridayReads. Publishers (and, occasionally, authors) pay to be the weekly giveaway and have a specific book promoted by Bethanne Patrick, who started FridayReads lo these not so many years ago. “Foul!” they cried. And some of them proceeded to toss the baby out with the bathwater with great force.
Which makes me sad. Should those three people have been more transparent about what they were making money on? Yes, absolutely. They didn't hide it, but they could have communicated it more effectively (ooh! marketing lesson!). I don't necessarily agree with what or how things have been done on that front, but I've chosen to ignore it in favor of continuing to promote reading.
Truth is, I would love to be compensated for even some of the time I spend on FridayReads. But whether I am or not, I stand by my commitment to encouraging reading. I’ve gotten some nasty messages today, and while they’re depressing and make me glad I keep my location pretty general on the Twitters, I’ve never been in this to fool, trick, coerce, nor mislead anyone.
I believe in reading. I’m not snooty about it; I have as much respect for someone reading Jim Patterson’s latest as I do for the poor soul slogging through WAR AND PEACE. Neither is my cup of tea, but isn’t that what makes reading great, that we can read things of different lengths, about any topic at all, on a page or a screen, and in any language on Earth?
I think so. Which is why I will keep promoting FridayReads. And if at some point someone wants to compensate me for the time I spend doing so, great—with one caveat: my opinion is not and never will be for sale. And I will never game the data. Oh, wait…that’s two caveats.
Thank you for your indulgence. Comments, questions, and even criticisms are welcome.
