I’m not going to buy what you’re selling!

You know, I have been a member of Twitter for some time (nearly 2 years now). When I first started out on Twitter I had a different name. Then I changed my name when I started this blog to @anIMjourney. I am contemplating changing again. Am I a fickle Twitterer? Li’l bit, I guess.

The problem is that although I am doing this blog and although I am still (albeit slowly) learning about Internet Marketing, I have come to a realization. That realization is that Internet Marketing is not WHO I AM. I don’t mean that I don’t want to do Internet Marketing, but I think I’ve decided that it’s not the main representation I want to make of myself on Twitter.

Does that make me deceptive? I would like to think it’s quite the opposite. After much thought and consideration, I think I want to change my Twitter name yet again (hopefully for the last time) to something that represents more of who I am than just a budding Internet Marketer. I have only one Twitter account…and I’d kinda like to keep it that way.

Up until a couple of days ago, I followed only a few (less than 60 or 70) people on Twitter. I only had a few (right around the same number) of followers. Then I started a little bit of an experiment. I started by following the people who were following me that I wasn’t following (how many times can one person say “following” in a sentence???) I then followed several people that a few of my friends mentioned in #followfriday. Since then, I have followed new people who are following me, and my number of followers has nearly doubled in about 2 or 3 days. There are a few people that followed me that I followed and then immediately removed because of the spam-like content of their posts.

Anywho, back to the reason for the title (and first sentence) of this post. Although I am not new to Twitter…I’m new to following as many people as I now follow. I’m working on being more “open” to following more people. It’s taking some adjusting, but I think I’m getting used to it. If you follow me, I am happy to follow you in return, so long as you don’t spam the crud out of me!

Look, I have grown to like Twitter. I enjoy letting my followers know when I make a new blog post or if I come across an interesting article or, heck, even say I’m spending time with my wife. I’m not sure how much anyone really cares, but it’s a little fun and slightly addicting. And I really enjoy when I see tweets from the people I respect. There are some of you out there who I am sometimes downright conversational with on Twitter. But if you follow me, and I return the favor, I don’t want my eyes beaten to the back of my skull by the hoards of things you think you can sell me. I also don’t want to see you post the same sales pitch over and over and over. There’s a pretty good chance I am NOT going to buy anything from you. If all you do is make it harder for me to find the tweets that I actually enjoy reading, I will promptly UNfollow you, possibly even block you. Then, what are you following me for? Something tells me I don’t have anything you’re interested in seeing if you’re just looking flood me with sales pitches.

I’m am (and I am not) sorry for this rant. It’s not my typical style on this blog, but maybe someone new to Twitter might come across this some day and feel some relief that they’re not the only one who feels this way.

Other than that…if you are following me on Twitter and not trying to spam me to death…THANKS FOR FOLLOWING. I am trying to pay attention, now, when I gain new followers and add them to the list I follow. I WANT to return the favor and I WANT to have a mutually beneficial Twitter relationship. And – if you’re a respectable and good Twitterer…then who knows…maybe I WILL buy something you’re selling someday

If I end up changing my Twitter name, I’ll let you know so you’ll know who that guy is you’re seeing posts from!

More time has passed, more thought has been thunk, and I think…I THINK I have an idea of where I actually want to go. But, let me back up a little bit and share a little bit of what’s been on my mind.

First of all, Anna Williams wrote a post a while back called “The Story of Suzie” that really made me think. If you haven’t read it…do so. It made me realize that I needed to learn to cook an egg. Not a literal egg. If you’re wondering what the heck I’m talking about, then you haven’t read it yet, and you haven’t heeded my instruction to do so…so do so!

Anyway in addition, I follow Anna on twitter, and she tweeted a link to another article that really made me think. The article was written by Josh Spaulding and was called “Why I Won’t Teach My Own Sister Internet Marketing“. In this article (again, if you haven’t read it…DO SO), Josh talks about one of the driving forces in success with Internet Marketing – a love of what you’re doing. At first when I read this article I began to think that maybe I was too hopeful to succeed in something that I just am not passionate about. I was right. AND I was wrong.

I realized that in all my trying-to-figure-out-what-to-do, I was really trying to focus on the wrong things. Do I want to make money online? I sure would like to. It would be nice to be able to free up my time so that I can do the things that I AM passionate about. But what I failed to realize is that these two separate things DO NOT have to be mutually exclusive.

I haven’t solved this puzzle for myself just yet. Not entirely. But I think I have figured out HOW I’m going to figure this out.

You see, so far, I think I have also been trying to do or be something that I am not. I’ve been trying to push a square peg through a round hole (did I REALLY have to use that cliche?) I think instead of trying to figure out something that I can do to make money…I am going to do something that I WANT to do and that I think I WILL enjoy doing…and see if from there I can turn it profitable. Maybe I will, maybe I won’t, but I’ll continue to tell it all here. That is, after all, what this blog is all about.

So, thanks for your patience, my loyal 4 readers (according to feedburner). Although, if you can believe my webstats, I’m up to over 1000 views per month on this li’l ol’ thing. I think it’s all the spambots though. If things go according to plan, you should start hearing from me more frequently in the coming weeks.

Happy Marketing!