I Finally Understood the Real Reason People with Good Jobs Bet Big on the Internet

Building a happy alternative matters

Good jobs.

5-digit monthly salaries.

A great career with upward mobility.

I have met many people with the above throughout my consulting career. They have what many of us want from the workplace.

Yet, in recent years, almost all of them spoke to me about their website, online writing, and low-touch side business.

Trust me. I mean it when I say almost all of them. Maybe 9.5 folks out of 10?

And I was stupid enough to ask them why.

I should have known.

The $15 e-Book Offer

If you can close 5 digits, 6 digits, and 7 digits in your day job…

… why bother selling e-Books for $15?

The sums don’t add up… if you choose to focus on the dollars and cents. It is akin to asking why I write online.

This is the thing.

We would rather deal with the cricket silence of the internet than attend to clients who,

• Nickel and dime us to hell.
• Spend $1 and try their best to rip $10 off our skins.
• Thinking that they deserve all the attention in the world after spending $100.

Oh. Come. On.

Give me a f**king break.

And we get disillusioned. Deep inside us, we might wonder what the best course of action is, leading to a fruitful life.

I mean, no one wants to deal with cheap clients. Or dance around them for a pittance.

So, we find a way.

And then, something beautiful happens.

We sold one copy of our e-Book one fateful afternoon.

That one single notification transforms thinking. Suddenly, we realize the possibility of making a living (not immediately, for sure) without boozing ourselves to liver failure.

That $15 has become the breadcrumb to a life we desire…

The Stabs We Stab Ourselves for $10,000

If you are in sales or consulting, for that matter…

I understand your daily pain. Yes, daily.

We are like hunter-gatherers on a safari.

• We strategize.
• We sharpen our rocks.
• We practice our javelin shots.
• We work on our escape.
• We chase our hunt.

And no matter what we do, we get hurt.

Of course, no one stabs us (literally) in the modern world.

That does not mean backstabbing is unreal. It is. The psychological damage can be crippling. Our morale spirals downwards.

• If you are in sales — Clients say nasty things to you.
• If you are in customer service — Clients scream at you.
• If you are in account management — Clients do their best to delay payments.

I have had the great fortune of working in all 3. Trust me. It is soul-sapping.

Once, I had a client who refused to pay $10,000 out of a $150,000 contract because the button on the buy page was not reflected with their corporate color.

She refused to listen to my explanation and threatened to poison my dog.

I almost died laughing.

I gave her what she wanted. That payment was delayed for a further 3 weeks because she required her complaint about my refusal to change the color to be acknowledged by my boss.

My boss told me he would not because it was unreasonable.

I reminded him about the $10,000 cheque.

(God, I sound cheap)

He retracted his fingers from the laptop, stared at me, sighed, and wrote an email to this client explaining that Aldric had been warned.

I cannot believe that I am chasing my boss to penalize me. And fast.

I know it sounds warped but that was the way to hit my sales target.

The Path of Low(er) Resistance

If you want to earn more — Learn from electricity.

They are known to be lazy. They tend to pursue a path of low resistance.

Create a circuit filled with rust, and you can be assured…

… that the electrical pulse will refuse to charge forward from the start line.

(No, they don’t, but you get the idea)

But how does that apply to us, you ask?

Firstly, you want to take stock of your work.

• Do you have annoying clients who want a side dish and dessert for free after a main course?
• Do you have vendors who take payment on time but never deliver work based on the agreed date?
• Do you have a boss who refuses to approve a $12 taxi claim?

And then work backward to find the commonalities behind them.

It can be money. Some clients are uncomfortable spending big money.

Maybe… it has to do with expectations. Your vendors cannot meet your bar, to begin with. But the money is good, so they… (fill in the blanks).

Is $12 too much for your boss to use his rights to approve?

If so, you can understand why people with high-paying jobs are (quietly) building their own thing online.

Here’s why.

The Close

Simple.

There is no face-to-face resistance.

The offer is on the landing page. Feel free to swipe left if you object to the price. The website owner is spared from your laments.

The bar is designed to be low to tap into the vast online market.

I understand if you have pricing objections to a $1,000 coaching course. What about a $15 e-Book? No?

Alright then. Feel free to download the lead magnet and study it.

See the beauty?

You can choose the offer you desire… without making me go nuts.

And I like that.

Enjoy my writing? Consider subscribing here. Or, get full access to Medium using this link and read gazillion exciting articles.