Does this sound familiar to
you? Your friend asks you, “What have you been up to?” You say, “
I’m into Internet marketing.” “What’s that?” You then proceed
to tell them how you market a product on the Internet. You tell them
about headlines, ad copy, advertising and ezines. “What’s an ezine?”
You explain it’s like a magazine they would find in a drugstore; the
difference is it comes in your email.
Everything is going fine for about ten minutes until you notice their
eyes are starting to glaze over. There’s a brief pause and they say,
“Hey, do you believe this weather we’re having?”
At that point, you realize that you’re boring them to death because
they have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about.
For over a year now, I’ve poured my heart and soul into Internet
marketing. I have devoted myself passionately to life within the
computer.
I went from someone who had to ask my husband how to turn on the
computer to someone who can now copy and paste with the best of them
(okay…I’m a slow learner). I trashed one computer in eight months
and I’m proud to say it will take me MUCH longer to trash my current
one.
I’m completely self-taught in online promotion and I’m proud of what
I’ve accomplished. I’m not a Net marketing “guru” and I never
will be one. But I’m not a “newbie” either.
It’s only natural for me to want to share my passion with friends and
loved ones. But I slowly came to realize that I’m speaking a foreign
language to them when I describe the inner workings of online marketing.
I have yet to meet someone in the “real world” who knows what an
ezine is.
My husband will tentatively ask me how my day was. When I launch into
advertising with autoresponders, viral marketing, I can see his
shoulders start to slump and this look of resignation comes across his
face. It says, “Oh, %#@*& ! I just had to ask!”
When I ask him to proof one of my articles, he gets this
deer-caught-in-the-headlights look in his eyes. Even though I’ve
begged him to be brutally honest, I know he’s thinking, “What can I
say? I don’t even understand what she’s writing about!”
I think I’ve finally come to understand that what we do on the
Internet is very specialized. Never mind that there are thousands of us
doing it. Those of us who spend hours each day on the Internet
advertising, reading and learning, give so much of ourselves to this
endeavor. When we’re not online, we’re brainstorming headlines, ad
copy and articles. Internet marketing is in every fiber of our being.
Keep us away from the computer too long and we go into severe
withdrawal.
I don’t know about you, but marketing is both a challenge and an
outlet for me. The challenge is to learn as much as I can absorb and use
what I’ve learned effectively. The outlet is tapping into that part of
my brain that is creative.
I have come to understand that to some extent I have to keep my life
online and my life offline separate. I tell my friends just enough and
then shut up (hopefully before they are frantically looking around for a
means of escape). Nothing is worse than to have someone rattling on and
on about something you have absolutely no interest in.
But that’s okay. There are plenty of people like you who DO understand
what I’m talking about. And I don’t have to explain to you what an
ezine is.
“There are as many ways to live and grow as there are people. Our own
ways are the only ways that should matter to us.” Evelyn Mandel
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Jo McNamara lives in Orlando, FL with 8 cats and 1 husband.
You may receive other articles written by Jo at:
mailto:articles_jomc@sendfree.com
"I wish I’d found the Internet Marketing Success Arsenal
when I first started out...I would have saved myself countless,
wasted hours and more money than I care to think about!"
http://www.what-works-online.net
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