“What Do You Do for a Living?” they Ask…
January 12th, 2009 | 
Author: Making a living online means you’re going to have to explain over and over again what it is you do – because it’s not like being a baker, a stock market trader, or a wedding planner. With those careers, people know when you tell them.
Internet marketer? What the hell is THAT? Do you SPAM people for a living, they’ll ask.
“No, I work on the Internet,” you’ll reply.
Then you might hear the say, “Oh cool! I have a computer that needs fixing. Can you do it?”
After explaining that you’re not a repair technician, they’ll give you another look – the one of, “Ohhhh I know what you do – you promote those porn sites, don’t you?”
How will you deal with people like this? Some marketers might have fun letting others speculate that they’re next big porn promoter on the ‘net – scandalous! But most wouldn’t. You don’t want to be seen as a shady spammer – or worse – you want your career on the ‘net to be validated by someone. Given a seal of approval for honesty, integrity and resourcefulness!
You help save the planet with your work at homeness, damn it!
Sorry, but there’s no degree for being an Infopreneur.
And it’s not just friends and family who will make accusations – it’s your own customers! They’ll land on a site, type in their name and email address and download something from you – and then wonder why you have the audacity to email them in the future.
You’ll have to explain to them if they ask that it’s a subscription. Better yet, put a small disclaimer in each email that reminds them of the fact that they signed up for the news and then tell them how to opt out if they need to.
If you’re an infomarketer, try telling your friends and family that you publish digital books online. Mention Amazon Kindle and Oprah – they’ll recognize it then and ooohhh and ahhh over your entrepreneurial spirit.
If you focus on affiliate marketing, tell people that you promote how-to courses through advertising. If it’s an AdSense site that you run, explain that you make your money like Perez Hilton! You have people paying to advertise on your site. Although Mario (aka: Perez) makes tens of thousands of dollars each month.
Many marketers just tell people they design websites, but beware of using this tall tale because then they’ll be asking you to create one for them!
More and more stories are coming out in mainstream magazines about how the average person makes money online. Ashley Squalls makes $70k a month the same way Perez does – she runs a free MySpace layout site and charges for ad space!
Don’t let it get you down if you don’t get the acclaim you were hoping for by entering into a career that’s not yet a household name. Be proud that you’re paving the way for the future as more and more entrepreneurs and business entities launch and grow their presence on the World Wide Web!
Tiff 
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Hi Tiffany,
A great read that most of us will have experience with in our everyday lives and sometimes ‘Family’ in my own experience are the worst to try and explain what you do to.
I have no-one in my family circle or close friends who fully understands what I am doing…I have tried to explain it as simply as possible to them but nearly all the time I get that ‘Blank look’ of incomprehension back!
What saddens me most is that a number of the Female members are working in niches that they could easily make a living from on line…but despite numerous attempts to get them to write down their experiences or allow me to interview them I get the usual excuse of ‘I haven’t got the time’ or ‘Talk to me later about it’ and the cycle just repeats itself.
So I just keep bashing away at it on my own, I have made great strides myself and I’ll just continue to do so and then one day they might actually sit up and take notice and want a part of the action!
Keep opening the minds of others with your great posts!
Best wishes
Ted Newman
http://www.tednewman.name
thanks,
I am so far behind. It is a pleasure to find you and to learn from you. You are appreciated and thought of often.
PS
I love the wave and the smile on your Twitter avatar.
Great article, Tiffany.
I run into this all the time, and can tell that my answers to that question are not really getting through to people. So, I usually just end up by saying, “Well, the bottom line is I sell stuff on the Internet.”
Mike Stokes
Baton Rouge, LA
I have experienced this before; but we just returned from visiting family and friends in NE. (we lived most of our lives there and moved to CA. 8 years ago) and the attitude and questions you are writing about were faced everywhere we went.
“What are you doing now?” was the most asked question or else it was “Explain to me again what you are doing”. After hearing giggles from 3 of my women friends as they asked me, “What in the hell is a squidoo?”; I finally realized that I was telling them more than they could handle.
We then adopted the affiliate response you mentioned and they would glaze over and go on to something else. Instead of feeling bad about it; I felt this sense of “smug” knowing that I was so much smarter than many other people!