WANTED: Your Participation - The info in this post could make you money

Skip,

Thanks for explaining.

I don't want you to think I was Having A Go At YOU. I was merely using your Text as a Super Convenient Example of a Problem which is Rife in the How To field.

By Pointing It Out readers may now understand why they don't go ahead with something, or even feel Disappointed in some Works - and - writers can know what they need to do to make their work More User Friendly. And it applies to Forum Posts too.

How often does someone ASK about marketing their business and get advice like, run classified ads, send press releases, do a flyer drop, etc. All good WHAT, but greatly lacking in the HOW. How do I write a classified ad, where do I run it, what kinds of things do I put in it? How do I write a Press Release, who do I send it to - or find out who to send it to? And so on. Each Statement generates its own list of HOWs which follow.

Granted, some HOWs would take a Long time to answer, while some could be answered with a short sentence "Do a Google for 'how to write a classified ad' and read as many articles on it as you can", for example

But also know, maybe the HOW of something can also be its own work. So while the list of Ways To Market would be a Work, individual Works could be created which go into Greater Detail for each of the ways on the list. Helping the writer Come Up with an Additional Work to offer.

I do like offers of help or Assistance from an author. Though we all know most people who do need such help will not ASK - I bet most don't even know what they need help with. And some will simply Shut down with the info. As Robet Allen says, "A confused mind says "no"".

It's like those Game Shows where the contestant has Helps - maybe they can Phone A Friend or Ask The Audience. They don't know the answer but won't use a help, and get it wrong and are out.

I've not given the reason for not asking, any thought. Though I'd say it's more than just "appearing dumb". I think it goes deeper than that. Maybe as deep as our Instinct to Copy as a way to learn - we need to learn this way because we aren't born with full language comprehension and speaking ability. And so we actually have to learn to "learn by ASKing" instead of "learn by observing and doing" which all animals do instinctively. But as we aren't taught to "learn by asking" we tend not to and rely on our fallback method of learn by observing and doing.

Michael Ross