With the advent of ‘Mad Men’, a brilliant TV show on AMC, a lot of my friends and family seem to think I sit around drinking Scotch and soda.
It’s not quite like that.
So I thought I’d give a brief outline of a typical day at my internet marketing company:

7:00 AM: Get to the office. Check our client dashboard for traffic, sales, leads and other conversions.
7:30 AM: Set my to-do list for the day. Hmmm. 4 things. Not bad, I can do that. I start working on a client report.
9:30 AM: Wow, 2 hours writing! Wait, what’s that ‘alert’ e-mail I just got?
9:35 AM: One of my ever-sharp staff come and tell me that the alert’s already handled. I slow my breathing and take a Tums.
10:30 AM: Meeting with a client’s marketing team to review our search marketing plan.
11:30 AM: Grab lunch. Eat while reviewing marketing-related RSS feeds.
12:30 PM: Another alert. A blogger wrote a really nasty review of a client’s product. The team gets together, works up a strategy, checks to see if the blogger’s statements are true and responds (blogger later published a more moderated review and an apology).
2:30 PM: I’ve completed 1 item on my to-do list. Account review meeting with my team.
2:40 PM: Meeting’s done. Start on second ‘to-do’.
3:00 PM: Call home to see how kids’ school day went.
4:00 PM: Finish my second to-do. Send report and comments to the account team.
4:30 PM: Add to Portent’s staff marketing handbook, the Fat Free Guide.
5:00 PM: Go home. Play with kids, tend to the guinea pigs.
6:00 PM: Clean up after dinner (this isn’t the 1950s).
8:00 PM: Kids are in bed. Write a blog post.
9:00 PM: Now, about those other 2 to-dos…
So, before you start looking to internet marketing for the splendor of 1950s Madison Avenue, print this blog post and read it 3 times. If you still want to start an internet marketing company, you’re a true enthusiast. Go for it!