Online marketing is not an easy job.  When the idea of ecommerce came about, everyone immediately started pitching the idea of “make money while you sleep”.  Those of us who have worked in the industry for a while know that this concept is not only absurd, but potentially dangerous.  Just like any business, ecommerce is something that needs to be constantly monitored, updated, changed and tested.

The other side of this though is finding ways to get “off the clock” so to speak.  Because ecommerce is a 24/7/365 situation, there are always customers interacting with your site regardless of the day and time.  As a result, there is a nagging yearn to continually check to see how sales are doing, where you’re ranked, etc.  This past week while I was on vacation in Kauai, I found myself checking orders and site status on my phone a bit too often.  I did manage to avoid calling the office (which was a first), but I still couldn’t find a way to completely unplug.

Its almost like a drug.  Every time you see orders come in or check your Google rank (with high rankings of course), its like you get a moment of gooey euphoria.  The other side of this though is when you check and things aren’t going as well as you’d like.  That’s when the panic sets in and you start thinking things like:

“Is the site broken?”
“Is someone running a huge sale that I don’t know about?”
“Does everyone all of the sudden hate us?”
“Does someone have an inside track with Google to get their rankings higher than me?”

And the paranoia builds and builds until either a) sales and rankings improve or b)  you find a way to disprove every one of the hundreds of silly questions running through your head.  The real key though is simply letting go.  I can’t control Google.  Sometimes they’ll rank me #1, other times they won’t.  I know the basics of what’s important to Google (strong, well written, relevent content) and over time I’ll be rewarded.  Because I use Alert Site, I know within a couple of minutes if the site is down (which it almost never is).  If someone is running a “buy more, lose more” sale (as they do from time to time), I can’t control it and I’m not likely to match it, so I just need to ride it out.

That’s why I’m going to see if I can start applying some basic concepts of Buddhism to ecommerce – understanding that suffering comes from craving and the first step to finding enlightenment is the cessation of suffering (yes, I know that I’m Jewish and this is beyond armchair Buddhism, but I really like the whole Four Noble Truths concept).

Yiddish Word of the Moment:

Schmutz
Definition:  Dirt, gunk
Example:  You’ve got some schmutz on your face, let me get it off (proceed to then lick your thumb and wipe it off like any good bubbie would).