"And we'll have to do something about the book buying . . .
" That was a key phrase of Euan's in our big financial
discussion.
And he is right, we shall have to do something about it, both on a financial and house space level.
I
am a sucker for books,particularly ordering them online. I love them coming through the mail, I find the
anticipation really exciting, the setting aside of an evening to read.
I justify the ridiculous numbers involved - in the winter, when I am at my
worst as there is most reading time, a package of books arrives most weeks - by
feeling that it is cheaper than gym membership and keeps my brain
working.
As with most of my bad habits, my first instinct is to blame my parents.
They deal in antiques and justify buying books with the phrase "well you
only need to find one thing in it to pay for the book". They are
right - they are talkingabout spotting an arcane Moorcroft case or Gimson
designed table - and they have walls and walls of books to prove their point.
For me most of those wonderful mind stretching moments come from reading.
My second last package of books arrived a couple of days ago. It was a good
choice containing a couple of books that I shall force myself to sip, rather than
gulp.
The one I have begun is Small is the new big by Seth Godin. I hadn't come across Godin before - though I expect that everyone else has. He is a marketing writer and Small is the new big is a collection of his writings - many of them blog posts - each putting forward a slightly off centre argument designed to make you think. In collecting them together here he seems to have created something different than his daily blog.
I have read some blog based books where I have honestly felt that they added very little to whatever had already been published in the blog. They may be beautiful, well written, sumptuously illustrated and in a format easier to curl up with in front of a fire, but there was nothing actually different, no slanting point of view.
So I am using Godin's mini essays to prod myself into really thinking about business and the way marketing works. He describes the book as being "a small prod or maybe a friendly whack - I dare you to read any ten of these essays and still be comfortable settling for what you've got". I gasped out loud on his definition of hard work as being about risk (as opposed to long hours slaving away within my comfort zone).
His blog post yesterday was about how you can easily sell other people's things on your blog but not your own as the power is in the referral, not the self promotion. And that is so true, and it made me think about referral and its power and how small businesses can use it on the web.
The only trouble is that I now want to read his other books . . .the library laughed when I called to see if they had a copy and suggested inter-library loan for a price that is actually higher than ordering it from ABE!
We have snow here - just the weather for curling up with a book. . . . hmmm . . . . does anybody have any other thought provoking websites that I can read in the meantime?
