B-777 Captain
http://www.usatoday.com/travel/columnist/getline/2004-11-08-ask-the-captain_x.htm
This week’s newsletter is being written by the newest B-777 captain! What a thrill to be finished with school and FINALLY being able to fly a real airplane again. Simulators are great, but they don’t even bring you any coffee or anything. That’s no good!
Above is the link to this week’s edition of “Ask The Captain” published by USAToday.com. Response is still heavy; in fact, there was a giant surge of new subscribers on Thursday of last week. If you happen to remember subscribing that day (November 4th) I’d be interested in discovering how you heard about my column. You can write to me here: capnmeryl@fromthecockpit.com
Depending upon how soon you read this after receipt, I am possibly over the North Pacific on my way to Osaka, Japan. This Sunday I’ll be flying an overnight domestic trip from Chicago to San Francisco, Denver, then back to Chicago, and then leaving Tuesday for Osaka. I will be thinking of you as I sip my Japanese tea on my layover. Incidentally, if you ever wind up on my flight (it’s actually happened once already) please let me know you’re there—either before or after the flight, or by note via flight attendant during the flight. I always announce the pilots’ names over the public address system.
Book sales continue to increase. Barnes & Noble bookstores contacted me this week to let me know they’re starting to stock, and several large airport bookstore distributors have also ordered. This is a huge victory because it is rare-to-never that airport bookstores with such limited space will sell other than mainstream-published books. I was able to convince them that if ever there was a book appropriate for airports—this is it.
If you would like to order, the quickest way is still to go directly to my distributor, either through my website www.fromthecockpit.com, at bottom of home page, or by simply calling 1-800-345-6665. Be sure to ask for the “subscribers’ special” and mention this means free shipping either in the comments section of order form or when speaking to the person taking your order. Shipping is normally $4.95.
This next section is geared toward the many of you who have written asking me how I’ve managed to get so much publicity for my book. My web guy, also known as my Other Half—-Al—-is working on a new site for my publishing company “Lorrie Press,” named for our chattering lorrie, Houdini. (A lorrie is a red, medium-sized tropical bird of the parrot family and they talk a LOT as the name implies.) There will be information there for those of you interested in getting something published and how to promote products or causes without spending even a dime on advertising, etc.
Al, by the way, is a retired United B-747-400 captain and is subjected to a reading out loud of each column before it goes to my USAToday.com editor. He not only tolerates this in good humor, but has made many helpful suggestions to help shape the final version you read. You will find his picture in my book.
Please keep your questions coming, either through my own website www.fromthecockpit.com or through my column at USAToday.com/travel where a link is provided for you.
If you have no interest in how I’ve gotten my privately produced book into the marketplace, you might want to stop reading here. The rest of this is business-oriented and in response to several inquiries until I can get a separate site up.
My new site will have some resources I can share with those of you who are interested in writing your own books, or who want to promote other products, but one link I can give you right now is this one: http://www.nationalpublicitysummit.com/info.html?10147
If you click on this link and scroll down, you will see a picture of me and a quote. The picture is a still shot taken from a local TV interview done at DIA (Denver International Airport) promoting a local book-signing. Those spikes in back of me are the “tents” at DIA. I cannot speak highly enough of Steve and Bill Harrison, who own RTIR (Radio-TV Interview Report), a publication read industry-wide by media people looking for interesting people and subjects. Bill and Steve are the most honest, straightforward, communicative people I have ever dealt with. They ALWAYS over-deliver and this event was far more than I could have hoped for. This is how I came to be contacted for an appearance on The View. I spoke directly with a producer at this event last July in New York.
The USAToday.com column is something I was able to negotiate on my own, but the “Publicity Summit,” put on twice per year, is just phenomenal. This is the event which puts you face to face with producers at The Oprah Winfrey Show, The View, other national TV shows, many prominent magazines and dozens of radio talk show hosts. I have done at least 40 interviews of one kind or another since attending this “Publicity Summit.” I’ve had to turn down some of them for lack of time. This event is pricey (although not with relation to what it’s worth) but well worth the price of admission as it lets you cut through all the red tape and talk directly to media decision-makers. Whether you have a product now or are just working on one, it’s worth taking a look at attending this Summit. There is an opportunity for a refund if you get there and decide it’s not for you after all, but I haven’t heard of anyone asking for a refund.
If you have questions about publishing independently, or about how to become really good at getting free publicity, go ahead and shoot me those questions. They may not be answered immediately but will give me a good basis for the content at my new website.
Until next time,Maintain Airspeed
Cap’n Meryl
This week’s newsletter is being written by the newest B-777 captain! What a thrill to be finished with school and FINALLY being able to fly a real airplane again. Simulators are great, but they don’t even bring you any coffee or anything. That’s no good!
Above is the link to this week’s edition of “Ask The Captain” published by USAToday.com. Response is still heavy; in fact, there was a giant surge of new subscribers on Thursday of last week. If you happen to remember subscribing that day (November 4th) I’d be interested in discovering how you heard about my column. You can write to me here: capnmeryl@fromthecockpit.com
Depending upon how soon you read this after receipt, I am possibly over the North Pacific on my way to Osaka, Japan. This Sunday I’ll be flying an overnight domestic trip from Chicago to San Francisco, Denver, then back to Chicago, and then leaving Tuesday for Osaka. I will be thinking of you as I sip my Japanese tea on my layover. Incidentally, if you ever wind up on my flight (it’s actually happened once already) please let me know you’re there—either before or after the flight, or by note via flight attendant during the flight. I always announce the pilots’ names over the public address system.
Book sales continue to increase. Barnes & Noble bookstores contacted me this week to let me know they’re starting to stock, and several large airport bookstore distributors have also ordered. This is a huge victory because it is rare-to-never that airport bookstores with such limited space will sell other than mainstream-published books. I was able to convince them that if ever there was a book appropriate for airports—this is it.
If you would like to order, the quickest way is still to go directly to my distributor, either through my website www.fromthecockpit.com, at bottom of home page, or by simply calling 1-800-345-6665. Be sure to ask for the “subscribers’ special” and mention this means free shipping either in the comments section of order form or when speaking to the person taking your order. Shipping is normally $4.95.
This next section is geared toward the many of you who have written asking me how I’ve managed to get so much publicity for my book. My web guy, also known as my Other Half—-Al—-is working on a new site for my publishing company “Lorrie Press,” named for our chattering lorrie, Houdini. (A lorrie is a red, medium-sized tropical bird of the parrot family and they talk a LOT as the name implies.) There will be information there for those of you interested in getting something published and how to promote products or causes without spending even a dime on advertising, etc.
Al, by the way, is a retired United B-747-400 captain and is subjected to a reading out loud of each column before it goes to my USAToday.com editor. He not only tolerates this in good humor, but has made many helpful suggestions to help shape the final version you read. You will find his picture in my book.
Please keep your questions coming, either through my own website www.fromthecockpit.com or through my column at USAToday.com/travel where a link is provided for you.
If you have no interest in how I’ve gotten my privately produced book into the marketplace, you might want to stop reading here. The rest of this is business-oriented and in response to several inquiries until I can get a separate site up.
My new site will have some resources I can share with those of you who are interested in writing your own books, or who want to promote other products, but one link I can give you right now is this one: http://www.nationalpublicitysummit.com/info.html?10147
If you click on this link and scroll down, you will see a picture of me and a quote. The picture is a still shot taken from a local TV interview done at DIA (Denver International Airport) promoting a local book-signing. Those spikes in back of me are the “tents” at DIA. I cannot speak highly enough of Steve and Bill Harrison, who own RTIR (Radio-TV Interview Report), a publication read industry-wide by media people looking for interesting people and subjects. Bill and Steve are the most honest, straightforward, communicative people I have ever dealt with. They ALWAYS over-deliver and this event was far more than I could have hoped for. This is how I came to be contacted for an appearance on The View. I spoke directly with a producer at this event last July in New York.
The USAToday.com column is something I was able to negotiate on my own, but the “Publicity Summit,” put on twice per year, is just phenomenal. This is the event which puts you face to face with producers at The Oprah Winfrey Show, The View, other national TV shows, many prominent magazines and dozens of radio talk show hosts. I have done at least 40 interviews of one kind or another since attending this “Publicity Summit.” I’ve had to turn down some of them for lack of time. This event is pricey (although not with relation to what it’s worth) but well worth the price of admission as it lets you cut through all the red tape and talk directly to media decision-makers. Whether you have a product now or are just working on one, it’s worth taking a look at attending this Summit. There is an opportunity for a refund if you get there and decide it’s not for you after all, but I haven’t heard of anyone asking for a refund.
If you have questions about publishing independently, or about how to become really good at getting free publicity, go ahead and shoot me those questions. They may not be answered immediately but will give me a good basis for the content at my new website.
Until next time,Maintain Airspeed
Cap’n Meryl
<< Home