I think this is a great example of the sort of situation where the more we press and try to evangelize, the less it'll work. There are a whole lot of people out there pressing and evangelizing various spiritual programs, and so long as AYP is promoted at trade shows and the like, it will be perceived as just another contestant on the marketing obstacle course. If AYP were truly no more than "just another contestant", then, indeed, joining the pack and running hard would be the thing to do.
But if AYP grows more quietly, more organically, more via the slow, unforced build of word of mouth (i.e. not because any of us are ASKING practitioners to promote, but just the viral outgrowth of folks finding tremenous value and, naturally, spreading the word on their own), that'll be more successful in the end, because AYP has the advantage of being tremendously efficacious. And efficacious stuff promotes itself....very gradually. The organic way requires a lot more time, but a lot less stress, energy, and money. The pressing way is high stress and high resource, but if timing's right and the market's right (I'm not sure either are), you can maybe make things happen a little quicker.
In other words, if I shlep boxes of books to every yoga class in town, I'm seen as one of a vast sea of proselytizers, and that is more likely to repel than to work. But if I do AYP and get calm and peaceful and even just five people deeply notice and three look into AYP, that's a much stronger thing. obviously, it takes longer, though. But the transmission/dissemination is at a deep level, and showing a dignity that's befitting of this practice. (And this, incidentally, is what I'm doing. I'm slowly slipping the books to a few yoga teachers who know me well and respect me...not the most famous ones, not the ones with the largest classes, just ones who are likely to understand. To some I give one meditation book, to others, a bunch of them to give out. And I'm very very careful to not be pushy about it, because that just turns off people.)
Some people with something to promote/market aim to go the organic route, but also push and goose a little by encouraging people to encourage people. Sort of a hybrid solution. That may work, but AYP is good enough that you don't need to push people. You just need to give them time to experience the fruits. As they do, dissemination will start to occur. Yogani, I think even if you do absolutely nothing else, this will catch on. But slowly. Yogani, I hate to see you spending so much money. Let us do that heavy lifting for you....but organically. Over years and years. The operation I work for managed to do exactly that...created a known brand without spending a dime by letting other people advocate. We never pushed (we just did what we did as well as possible and counted on people to fall in love with what we did). And that lack of pushiness was key to our success. If we'd pushed, it wouldn't have happened the same way.
I recommend an AYP approach to promoting AYP. It's slow, very slow, but if we can wait a decade or two, and not get caught up in visions of thriving franchises, countless people could eventually be practicing.
Hmmm...just reread this posting. One very important point: if anyone DOES have a brilliant way to promote via "pushier" tactics, go for it! If Victor wants to shoot Rodney Yee an AYP book, go for it (I've sent one to another yoga star, fwiw)! Let's grab all the low fruit, for sure! I'm not suggesting giving up on scheming to get the word out a little faster. I'm just saying it will all happen on its own over time, anyway (how can it not?) and that pushing too much, especially via conventional channels, might be counterproductive.
