Some time ago, you may well remember, I undertook a challenge to raise money for charity through the sale of my ebook, LinkedIn Made Easy. Whilst I didn’t reach the dizzy heights I’d hoped to, I did raise a reasonable amount and it has now all be distributed.
Well what a 30 days it’s been. To say that I have been seriously challenged myself would be an understatement and I have learnt an amazing amount about a great many different things, some of them are personal and some of them are business and marketing focused. I have however, not managed to reach my target of £400,000 in 30 days, in fact I’m just a shade short of it …. by just about £399,660 🙂
It is noticeable that we are coming up to Christmas. People are either in a panic about how much they still have to do before the Christmas break or they are already winding down and attending function after function. I’ve noticed it myself. I’ve not been well and my own activity has been ‘lacking’ should we say. I’ve also had some big projects and presentations to complete and prepare for, as well as the ‘usual running a business’ activities that take place on a day to day basis.
I’ve not been well this week, had a nasty throat infection and at one point lost my voice entirely. However, it has not been entirely without merit either as I’ve noticed that when I take my eye of the ball and am not putting in the effort that I normally do that, guess what, people engaging with the project dry up!!
When it comes to marketing and social media it is worth bearing in mind that you can never know it all, and nor should you expect too. I was reminded of this quite forcibly during a conversation I had with Andy Lopata earlier today (thanks Andy, you put me back on track!), who very gently explained that I had forgotten one simple thing …. Give Back!
As you know I’m undertaking a 30 day challenge to raise £400,000 for charity by selling 200,000 copies of my e-book, LinkedIn Made Easy. As a result of the challenge I’ve been in touch with all sorts of people for all sorts of reasons but I today I received an email from someone special. His name is John Jocham and as a result of buying my e-Book he suddenly had lots of ideas about how he could promote his own challenge, which is to raise funds for Diabetes research. He’s contacted me on LinkedIn to see if I could help as well, hence this blog post; oh, and I gave him some other ideas for things he could do as well.
I’d like to challenge you to make a difference to YOUR business by using LinkedIn more effectively in the NEXT 30 DAYS. Running along side my own LinkedIn Made Easy 30 day challenge to raise £400,000 for charity in 30 days, I thought this would be a great way for YOU to concentrate your efforts on your business to make the change that needs to happen.
A star is born, no really … that’s what Rob Goodwin of Champagne Video Production told me today when he did a vox pop video of me for the challenge. And what fun it was too, I got to talk about the challenge as well as the book and he’s sending me a copy to help me promote what I’m doing. When it’s available I’ll add it to the website and you can see me in all my glory – ahem!
Update: 13 March 2010
The original project ended on 23rd December 2010. During the project, 40% of all money raised was given to one of three charities, The Hysterectomy Association, Kiva or the BCCT. Since the end of the project, 40% of the profits still go to charity.
Quite a few people have been asking me what exactly is going to happen to the money that is raised through the sale of LinkedIn Made Easy so I thought I’d try to expand on it a little more than I have done elsewhere:
Is it possible to change the world just one book at a time? I honestly believe so, which is why I launched a challenge to myself that started yesterday to sell 200,000 copies of my e-Book, LinkedIn Made Easy, in just 30 days – I’m on day 29 already, so the clock is ticking ….. fast!
Why would I set myself such challenge you might ask? In fact I do too on occasions, but in short it’s because I want to PROVE SOCIAL NETWORKING DOES WORK FOR BUSINESS – do you think I’ve shouted loud enough there?