What it means to be an Internet Writer...

Comic Cred: The Oatmeal

The comic above is humorous, but there's a lot of truth to it. In the last few weeks when trying to describe what it means to be a Social Media Manager to my peers-- mostly outside of academia--I get a lot of blank stares. They just don't seem to get it. They don't seem to understand its purpose. And this, as you can imagine, is baffling to me.

I mean, sure, I get paid to play around online all day... But I promise it's not in vain!

Thankfully, I came across this article last week which goes into detail on explaining content creation to non-content people. This is just a fraction of what I do overall, but I found it helpful.

They make it clear that we are NOT advertisers, but rather strategic marketers that create and share digital content, such as articles and videos, to inform, educate, or entertain you. Our end-all goal is for our audience to form positive associations after receiving valuable information and become brand ambassadors.  

I'm a bit of a minimalist and am constantly looking to make efficiencies in my life, so to find out about the one-liner approach made perfect sense. It makes the "What do you do?" conversation much more bearable. More importantly, it's easy for the other party to comprehend and remember so I can have fewer awkward conversations like the comic strip above. Phew!

What practices have you perfected in succinctly telling people what you do? Leave a comment below!

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