13
Jul
2015
By Calvin at 10:54 GMT, 10 years ago
Last week I received a very nice email from someone who had purchased a well-thumbed copy of a crime prevention book I wrote some ten years ago. He asked me if I had any intention of writing another one and this is what I replied:
‘Books about crime prevention, dare I say it, can be pretty tedious affairs and it won’t surprise you to learn that not many of them get sold. Those that register on the till are often referred to as ‘grudge purchases’ simply because people would rather spend their money on something else, such as half-price toilet paper on offer at the local supermarket rather than read the words of some clever dick like me and pay for the privilege!
‘Heather (from Essex Police) and I found this out when we wrote Home Security The Complete Handbook back in 2005. It was well-received and well-reviewed and we sold a few thousand copies, but our efforts were never going to make us rich beyond our wildest dreams. We did know that from the outset, so I suppose we did it for our own personal enjoyment and achievement and because we could.
‘That’s why, when I was approached by a publisher in 2010 to write another tome, I decided my literary career was over and instead created The Crime Prevention Website. A website about crime prevention is free and so you don’t need to choose between knowledge and bog paper – simple!
‘By the end of this year the total number of visits to the Crime Prevention Website since launch will have gone well past the one million mark. What happens to visitor numbers after that is difficult to forecast. Ben and I keep thinking we’ve probably reached the point beyond which we won’t see further rises, but each time the numbers click up another few percent.
‘So thank you for your very nice comments about the book, but I’ll be sticking to the website, so that people can continue to fill their lavatories with the softest of bargain basement toilet tissue.
‘All the best and thanks again’
If you’d like to help spread the word of the Crime Prevention Website please consider doing some or all of these things:
- If you work for a police force or other organisation that is not linking to The Crime Prevention Website please could you approach the boss and/or the people in charge of your media and see if you can make this happen. We would obviously reciprocate and link back and we would be happy to publicise any crime prevention campaigns they might be running.
- Follow us on Twitter and re-tweet our tweets
- Like our Facebook page and please share some of our stories, which takes just a couple of clicks
- Encourage people to take our free and confidential Home Security Survey
- Send us some words of encouragement, which we can post up on our testimonials page
- Have a go at contributing to the advice content on the website by using the 'Feedback on this page' in the top-left of every page
- Include a link to The Crime Prevention Website on your emails and newsletters
- Shout out something nice about the site from a roof-top or nearby hill
Linking to the Crime Prevention Website: http://thecrimepreventionwebsite.com/about/688/link-to-us/
