Last year, a lot of people who were employed by non-adult Internet
related companies lost their jobs. The year began with an American
election controversy and just got worse as the layoffs added up. While
many of the web-oriented ventures cited the September eleventh attacks
as the reason for their failures, the fact was they were failing anyway.
Too much money was thrown at anything having to do with cyberspace and
was lost due to a misguided belief that people would embrace online
shopping without question. Even well established companies spent
millions of dollars building a web presence only to find that nobody
wanted to spend money on their sites. When these masses of former net
high flyers were suddenly out on the street, a great many of them looked
to Internet porn as a way to make a living with their existing skills.
Add to the above mentioned unemployed all the other poor folks who
suddenly found themselves without jobs due to the affect that 911 had on
the economy and you end up with a lot of desperate people looking to
online porn as their savior.
The adult Industry welcomes you. We're glad you have an open mind and a
desire to work for yourself. We are more than happy you are bringing
with you your talent, experience and enthusiasm. You're entering an
exciting field that is on the cutting edge of technological and
promotional methodologies that the non-adult field can only dream of.
As a representative of the adult online entertainment industry, I feel
it's my duty to inform you of a few realities:
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Money:
Money is the name of the name. It buys software, web space, content and
traffic. As the saying goes when it comes to money, you have to spend it
to make it. But don't expect that dropping your last thousand dollars on
some images, a cool domain name and shopping cart software will get you
anything but a lost thousand dollars. This business takes a while to
understand and quick cash is for blood donors. Even well established
adult enterprises like Playboy thought they could overtake to online
market and forfeited great amounts of cash discovering they had to start
at square one just like everyone else. Start slowly and spend wisely.
Experiment with free hosts and free content for a while so you can get a
feel of how this all works.
Competition:
Get ready for it. The adult online entertainment profession is already
populated with tens of thousands of savvy salesmen who know more that
you have no desire to see you succeed. Imagine Glengarry Glen Ross and
cast your self as Jack Lemmon. While there are many good-hearted people
in this business, none of them are about to reach out to save the
drowning. Yes, you should make friendships and build associations but
never forget that the people you deal with have their own interests. If
they take the time to help you, be thankful. If they see you are doing
well, expect some of them to turn around and stab you in the back.
Honesty:
In a world where anonymity is the norm, it's easy to be tempted by less
than honorable methods of generating cash. Yes, you are now in sales and
walk a fine line between illusion and outright lies. But there is a line
and you should never cross it. Don't promise free access to a sponsor
when it isn't free. Don't offer help or services to fellow webmasters
and fail to deliver. Don't redirect, don't image source, don't steal,
and don't cheat. You may get a few dollars initially, but YOU WILL BE
FOUND OUT eventually.
SPAM:
As said, you are in sales, but good selling is subtle and creative.
Don't mass-email potential customers with unsolicited SPAM or terrorize
poor folks on instant messaging programs. Don't make your first topic in
an adult webmaster message board a SPAM for yourself. Find clever ways
to introduce yourself to the world and your peers. Hard selling is for
the desperate and fearful and everyone can smell it.
The reality is that the adult Internet is not for babies. Develop a
sense of your market. Develop solid relationships with others you can
trust. And most of all develop a thick skin.