http://ijumped.net poppy
As part of my new life, I am exploring and experimenting with some internet marketing. One of the “in” things to do if you are marketing something on-line (at the moment anyway) is to write articles. So lately I have written some articles as a bit of an experiment to see if I can attract some readers. One question that has arisen is the matter of pen names.
Let’s say I want to market a product that is new to me. If someone were to search for me on the internet to find out about me, they would soon know that the product was not my current area of expertise because my name would not be associated with that niche. More than this, say I am a bit of an all-round internet marketer and over time I market a number of varied products, anyone can see this if they search for my name. I could appear to be a jack of all trades and a master of none. If I build a false persona around a pen name, the argument goes, that pen name would soon be seen as a specialist in that field. It would also, it is said, protect my privacy.
I have a bit of a problem with this. Like most people, I have concerns about identity theft and general privacy, but many of these concerns were born in the off-line world and actually I think that anyone can find out a lot about me if they want to, whatever I do. My problem though is one of integrity. “Ijumped” into the world of self employment with the wholehearted intention of doing business ethically, or not at all. Having considered all of the arguments, using a pen name for me is not about leading people to believe I am an expert in a given niche. No, for me using a pen name is about MISleading people to believe I am an expert in a given niche. The distinction is an important one. I don’t want to sell things by misrepresenting myself. I don’t want to do business that way.
For this reason, I will take the consequences of using my REAL name when I write.
Authors bio is coming up shortly.
