Prerequisite knowledge. YES. All of this. And not just this. The lack of understanding of prerequisite knowledge is a curse on this open-mic night of how to’s and tutorials. I remember hitting it worst when I was trying to get into Python. “step 1, start up your IDE.”
Revised step 1 “WTF IS AN IDE.”
Ah, independent development environment. Everyone recommends Anaconda for this. Ok. Installed.
Anaconda step 1: “Type import -py into your shell script.”
Revised step 1: “WTF IS MY SHELL SCRIPT.”
It, quite literally (I mean this literally) never ended. I don’t do Python.
This also happened when trying to research the mechanics of spasticity, but there I get it because it’s a fair expectation that I have some sort of medical or therapeutic degree. And there I did chase all the threads to their start because I had to know.
Probably too late, but I chose Brevo for my mailing platform. Their free tier does everything I need. I’m on Wordpress and getting the integrations set up was not easy, but not as hard as what you described either. I’m using my gmail. And I only needed two tutorials, I think, to get the integrations set up. Email capture was free and easy. Contact me was a bit more of a bear.
YES a mailing list is important but don’t worry about automated campaigns (this is Business School / Marketing Department talking, not Author). The primary value is what is known as retargeting. The most likely people to buy your next book (or jump on a sale of your prior books) are the people who already know who you are and wanted to sign up for an email list. You’re looking at 50% conversion rate or higher. You absolutely want a place to capture these people and then contact them when you want them to take action (i.e., write reviews or read a book). All the work that goes into keeping them warm or talking to them every month is much lower value and higher effort. So focus on email capture, set expecations of low frequency, and forget about automations.
You’ve likely figured this out, but a FORM is inserted into your web page while a LANDING PAGE (LP) is it’s own page. The LP is specifically designed to receive people who click through from an ad or review or other link.
You need a form, because you are capturing people who are opting in to follow you. They’ll look up your website yadda yadda yadda. Your LP will be geared toward book purchase (or you may just be directing them straight to Amazon, using it as your LP). You do NOT want to attempt email capture at the LP for this type of sale. (it would be used for “high-nurture” sales, where you need to have a conversation with someone before they make an important or high dollar value decision, or for “deep discount” situations where you are trading them an email for a coupon code. We’re not in that business.)
Formatting a form sucks. I remember being very unhappy on this day(s).
This was a hard bit. Looking back, every step was easy. Trying to figure out what those 10 easy steps were was hard. A bit like the old text adventures:
Take necklace.
I don’t understand “necklace.”
Look table.
There is a necklace on the table.
TAKE NECKLACE
I don’t understand “necklace.”
TAKE NECKLACE ON THE TABLE
You take the necklace on the table and put it in your knapsack
A Grave Error. Just use your existing emacs installation.
(If I look over instructions I have written and see the word “just”, I rewrite them. It’s easy for me, but I’m writing the instructions; it may not be easy for you.)
I have seen this done as a game at a convention. One player has to give instructions for something like putting on a sock, while another player (whom the first cannot see) misinterprets them as creatively as possible.
Spent most of today with the kids clearing out old toys. 3 big sacks of plastic trash. Mum came in at the last moment, trying to salvage everything that could potentially go to a second hand shop, but eventually came to the same conclusion - our kids didn’t really leave anything in good enough condition for the Japanese market.
Embarking on a new post-daycare era. Hopefully they’ll choose their presents more carefully, and treat them a little better.
All of which made room for the Christmas tree, which they are still young enough to be excited about.
I am finally done with all the big photo projects for the year. I feel… relieved. Like a huge burden is gone. It was a lot this year. So many big feasts I made albums for. So many friends turned 50 this year.
Just now I made my calendars, travel pics and the other one for our friends with photos from all of them for all of us. I also collected 365 photos with photos of those same friends to make a digital daily calendar. I tried this year but because I didn’t preselect all the photos at once… I stalled at 250 or so when my job became too much.
And then there were the 2 big photo books I made for friends who turned 50 with photos from 20+ years (i don’t have digital photos before that).
It took me months to get those books done. The actual work was not quite that but it was work.
There is one more friend I need to do this for in a couple of years. (I can only do this for people I have a lot of photos for obviously. And not all friends are equally represented in my collection)
I love making these presents but it’s the sort of fun that pays off after the activity. The actual making is … difficult.
My photo collection is now at 98.000 plus a little. My partner suggeted when I pass the 100.000 next year we open a bottle of champagne. (I will pass 100.000 unless I start pruning which I have been meaning to do for the past 20 years)
They do show their appreciation and it’s so nice to watch them look through the books. And not just the recipients but the others who get to see them as well. Most of them have kept all the calendars I made for them over the years and have several of them up each year. It really brings people together and the kids will willingly pose for photos for me. For a few years now, I have begun hunting for pics from everyone (a few of my friends prove rather elusive when cameras are near).
The travel calendar has its 20st anniversary now. (Family gets those)
The friends calendar is in year 7 now.
The kids have talked about inheriting my photo collection (I have no kids of my own). Which I find rather sweet.
Came downstairs to find water coming out of the light fitting in the office. So something has obviously gone wrong with the plumbing from the shower in our new ensuite. So we’ve got the builders coming back. Yay…
Luckily, it seems my computer is ok but the desk and all the papers on it are sodden!
