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Room To Read is a fantastic organization whose mission is to help increase literacy in the world by distributing books to millions of children in developing countries. To celebrate the recent success of the Inbound Marketing Book (which skyrocketed to the #1 marketing book this weekend), we’re kicking off an inbound marketing campaign to promote the inbound marketing book (yes, it’s very meta). We want to simultaneously help Room To Read, which we think is a great cause.
Here’s what we’d like your help with: We’d like to raise $12,000 to sponsor the creation of three libraries in developing countries. Room To Read is shooting for a goal of 11,000 libraries by the end of 2010. You don’t need to donate any money (though if you want to, it’s a great cause). What we’re asking you to do is tweet this article and encourage others to tweet it too — particularly some of the people on our VIP list below. In return, we’re going to donate up to $12,000 to Room To read.
Here’s how we will calculate the donation:
Donation Amount = (# of Tweets To This Article) x (# of VIPs below that tweet) x ($0.05)
Deadline: Midnight Sunday, February 28th.
Example: So far, 11 VIPs have already tweeted, so each tweet is worth $0.55 (11 x $0.05). We have 300 tweets, so the donation amount is $165. If you convince a new VIP to tweet, it raises the per-tweet amount. If your tweet encourages others to tweet, it increases the donation amount. Just help spread the word.
Each tweet is currently worth: $0.90!
Dedicating a library to a brilliant inbound marketer: If we hit our goal of $12,000, Room To Read will dedicate one of the three libraries to whoever we designate. What we’ll do is get the community’s feedback on who you think is doing an exceptional job using inbound marketing to make the world a better place. We’ll then submit that person’s name for the library dedication.
Why are we doing this? It started as an idea to help promote the book and help a great cause at the same time. The original idea was different than what we have now, but Beth Kanter (non-profiteer extraordinire)
posted an excellent article this evening with some advice on how we could have done better. I read the article a few minutes ago (I’m at O’Hare airport), and decided to try a “Take 2” on the Inbound Marketing Book Charity Challenge. I'll post a link the original once I have Internet access again -- for now, I have to go catch a flight.
Doing your part: Please help spread the word and get us tweets — particularly tweets from VIPs. Oh, and if you have a cause or a company that needs to get more visibility, please buy the inbound marketing book. It’ll help you “get found” with Google, social media and blogs. If you use any of the links on this page, all profits from the book sales will be added to the donation amount.
Thanks for your support. -@dharmesh
VIP List (Each One Increases Donation per Tweet)Instructions for VIPs, just tweet something like this:
"Your tweets help a great cause with the Inbound Marketing Book Challenge. $0.90 per tweet! Plz RT."
1) Brian Halligan 
(thanks @bhalligan)
2) Dharmesh Shah (done)
3) RoomToRead (thanks for all that you do @roomtoread!)
4) David Meerman Scott (Thanks @dmscott!)
5) Seth Godin [tweet @thisissethsblog]
6) Guy Kawasaki [tweet @guykawasaki]
7) Chris Brogan (thanks @chrisbrogan!)
8) Rand Fishkin (thanks @randfish, now I don't have to kill you)
9) Jason Fried [tweet @jasonfried]
10) Brian Solis (thanks @briansolis!)
11) Todd Defren (thanks @tdefren!)
12) Gary Vaynerchuk [tweet @garyvee]
13) Robert Scoble [tweet @scobleizer]
14) Pete Cashmore [tweet @mashable]
15) Darren Rowse [tweet @problogger]
16) Tim O'Reilly (thanks @timoreilly)
17) Evan Williams [tweet @ev]
18) Jason Calacanis [tweet @jason]
19) Chris Pirillo [tweet @chrispirillo]
20) MC Hammer [tweet @mchammer]
21) Jeremiah Owyang [tweet @jowyang]
22) Loic Le Meur [tweet @loic]
23) John Jantsch (thanks John @ducttape!)
24) Dan Schawbel (thanks @danschawbel)
25) Laura Fitton (thanks, and great job spreadin the word!)
26) Sarah Evans [tweet @prsarahevans]
27) Om Malik [tweet @om]
28) Mari Smith (thanks @marismith!)
29) Matt Cutts [tweet @mattcutts]
30) Ann Handley [tweet @marketingprofs]
31) Beth Kanter (thanks @kanter!)
32) Steve Rubel [tweet @steverubel]
33) Andy Beal (thanks @andybeal!)
34) Ashton Kutcher [tweet @aplusk]
35) Jeremy Schoemaker [tweet @shoemoney]
36) Michael Arrington [tweet @arrington]
37) Jack Dorsey [tweet @jack]
38) Scott Stratten [tweet @unmarketing]
39) Dave Winer [tweet @davewiner]
40) Fred Wilson [tweet @fredwilson]
41) Al Gore [tweet @algore]
42) Biz Stone [tweet @biz]
43) David Allen [tweet @gtdguy]
44) Chris Sacca [tweet @sacca]
45) David Pogue [tweet @pogue]
46) Chris Anderson [tweet @tedchris]
47) Kevin Rose [tweet @kevinrose]
48) John Battelle [tweet @johnbattelle]
49) Neil Patel (thanks @neilpatel!)
50) Danny Sullivan [tweet @dannysullivan]
51) Joel Spolsky [tweet @joelspolsky]
52) Mitch Kapor [tweet @mkapor]
53) Chris Winfield (thanks @chriswinfield!)
54) Avinash Kaushik [tweet @avinashkaushik]
Thanks so much for your support. -@dharmesh
Any and all feedback is appreciated.