Yesterday, a local LA club promoter emailed me about his New Years Eve party… and CCd entire list on the email! In other words, each and every email address was visible to each and every email recipient. I decided that it might be time to teach him a lesson – after all, this was not the first time it had happened. I clicked “Reply All” with the devious plan to email the list with my OWN New Years Eve party details!
Before clicking ‘send’ however, I decided to take a public vote and to put it out on Facebook and Twitter. Within half an hour, 8 votes were in – 7 confirmed that it was a good idea to send the email, and only 1 person said I should not. I went back to the email with my ploy validated, and once again thinking I would press ‘send’.
However, I thought about it one more time and even with public support I chose NOT to send the email. Instead I just sent my cheeky response to the promoter to which he promptly replied with embarrassment and gushing thanks. I told him to have a great NYE and that I was “looking forward to combining forces in 2011” A far wiser move which creates new avenues for opportunity rather than resentment or hurt feelings.
The lesson here is that first of all, be very aware of what kind of energy is behind your actions. Perhaps I wanted to pump my ego, or was feeling greedy for sales of my own. At the very best I would have annoyed him, probably appeared like a spammer to those on the list and maybe got a sale or two. Hardly worth it. Another important lesson is to always be wary in heeding the advice of others – especially those who have the time to partake in votes like this 🙂
