I’ve been nagged for a while by the idea that I should move away from Kit, my email tool, because it comes with what I’ve come to think of as surveillance temptations – open rates, click tracking, all the ways you can watch what your readers do without them knowing.
I asked myself a question: would I be comfortable saying in a newsletter, “I sometimes look at who opens which emails, so I can send more relevant follow-ups to people who seem interested”?
The thought made me wince.
So I drew this picture, of my readers standing behind me as I work. And I’m putting it here as a commitment. I won’t filter the list to see who has clicked what. When I want to know who’s interested in something, I’ll ask, the way I did in March when I invited people to follow me as I made the Speccy Breakdown book. Some said yes. Everyone else was left in peace. That felt great.
Kit isn’t the surveillance system. Kit is where my readers are.
I’m going to keep it that way.