If you’re working from home, you’re going to be selling something.

There are tons of companies and MLM pyramids that will tell you that you’re not selling anything, you’re just sharing the information. I’m here to tell you they’re full of shit. If you go around sharing information without asking for a sale, you’re going to be far less successful than the person that says, “Would you like to charge it or write a check?”

Even if you’re a service provider, you have to sell yourself. It’s not that much different from a hooker on a street corner. Whoever is strutting the corner looking the most disease-free, is rocking the shortest skirt and the highest heels wins. You need to have your hooker outfit ready and be willing to show someone a good time when you get the chance.

Take me, for instance. I write. That’s how I make my money, and I make (what I consider) a good full-time income doing it. Here is what I did to get – and keep – my main gig:

1. Filled out the application. It was long, it asked for samples, and it took me over an hour to fill out…with no promise of even getting back to me. I didn’t have writing samples at the time and had to write them from scratch.
2. Found out stuff about the company. The company had a podcast – so I listened. The company had a call in for writers and “aspiring writers” – so I called in and listened and asked questions.
3. Picked up the phone. Probably the number one most important thing I did. I knew who to call because I heard her on the podcast and her title was “talent wrangler.” She answered the phone and I charmed her pants off. Asked her to “wrangle me, baby.” It was a fun phone call and put me on the fast track to being the company’s favorite writer.
4. Followed up. One phone call with some great bonding isn’t enough. You have to let them know you’re ready to work. I emailed about once a week with a “Hey, how’s it going?” email to let them know I existed and was ready to go to work when they needed me.
5. Didn’t screw it up. When I did get an assignment I turned it in on time. My first assignment was a $5 article rewrite. I got it back to her in ten minutes. I’ve never been late on an assignment since and they know I’m dependable. When we had a power outage? I went to a library in a neighboring town to do my work and submit it online. (Your library card doesn’t just get you on your local library’s computers, in most cases.)
6. Sweetened the deal. When I finished my first “big girl” assignment all my own I sent the editors, the owner, and the accountant a small box of truffles. It cost $60 to buy and send all that – but made an impression that has never gone away. I still send holiday gifts. They pay me thousands a month – I can suck it up and send out chocolate bunnies for Easter.
7. Don’t listen to the hype. I’ve seen forum posts and blog posts and blog entries about the company I work with and how you can’t make any money with them. How they only pay two cents a word and that’s just downright insulting. For another writer, this job might be awful because it does pay (in many cases, but not any I’m working on now) two cents a word. But if you type over a hundred words like I do you can easily make $40-$60 an hour, and when you’re talking about sitting on your ass in front of a computer making an average of $50/hr? Who cares what the price-per-word is? I’m all about my bottom line.

Jen is a work-from-home mom that actually works. She balances a full time writing career with two toddlers and a bun in the oven. She pretends that this is easy for her and causes no stress, so don’t burst her bubble and tell her she’s freaking out, okay?

So…you may not know that a few weeks ago I was on ABC News. A report about Twitter and how awesome it is. (Come follow me on Twitter – I’m always looking for new, interesting people!)

After being on the news, I had multiple people call that I hadn’t talked to in a long time. I’d helped each of these people in an unpaid “here’s what you need to know” kind of way and they all ended up spending lots of money with people who told them what they had to do for online business success right now – and they stopped talking to me.

I was happy to talk to each of these people, until I realized the first one pretended she wanted to catch up but really wanted me to redo her MySpace page (she was getting awesome online marketing advice, right?) The second, it turns out, has the exact same problem she did the first time I met her – and I’m currently redoing her website (outsourcing it actually) and will be done soon.

The third? I haven’t called back yet. She was my first networking buddy and it kind of hurt when we drifted apart. I’m afraid to talk to her for fear she is just going to ask me for free advice. Like when these people all saw my face on their TV screens they went, “Oh there’s that dumb chick that will give us free advice we won’t take!”

Ok, they probably didn’t say that. Maybe they even convinced themselves they really wanted to catch up and golly-gee-whiz if they could get that one little question asked… *sigh*

So, as a Bad Mommy Blogger I want to tell them all to go to hell. I don’t need the money, and I don’t really have the time. I’m already entrenched with one, so that’s going to go through, and that’s okay. But what do you do if your networking buddy calls and you find out she only wants to pump you for more free advice?

Do you tell her to go to hell?

What do you do when people ask you for free advice? Advice you know they’d have to pay someone else to get?

Even better, what do you wish you could do?

Jennifer is a mommyblogger, giver of free advice, and budget junkie. She is a stuck-up, horrible person who only talks to people that don’t own televisions and would never, ever watch reality television. Her dream is to write for the Huffington Post one day.

Ok – maybe not all of them, but I sure as hell am.

Seriously though, if you try and convince me that you are able to keep your house clean, interact with your children effectively, not keep the television on all day, plus you’re the most successful mommy on the block with your business…

…I call bullshit.

You either have a maid, nanny, husband not working, or you’re lying about your business success. (Or all of the above.) You know how I know that? Because sister, something’s gotta give.

There are 24 hours in a day, and everything we choose to do takes some amount of time. I cannot feed my kids a meal in less than ten minutes – no matter what. It takes at least a half-hour to fill the dishwasher, put soap in, and hit “clean.”

Now it might not take you the same amount of time it takes me to do things, but you know what I’m saying here, everything takes time.

On days when I have more work than time, the television is on all day. You know why? Because I have to get shit done, that’s why. But then having to turn around and hear some self-righteous WAHM try and spout off about how she made food from scratch while teaching her children how to add and subtract from birth while being rock-star successful and getting twelve new clients? No. Way. But you can’t go spouting off at the little angel or her cadre of wannabes will attack you and give you the litany of “how dare you”s for having the audacity to question the honesty of the statements.

I’m not jealous, either. I work from home very successfully – I just know that there are sacrifices I have to make every day – with every new level of success come more sacrifices. The more meetings I have to be on over the phone, the more I stagger when my kids eat so I know they are hungry – and their little mouths will be full and quiet – when that call happens. I’m not starving my kids, but they may not get fed the very minute they realize they are hungry.

Sure it sounds kind of shitty to deny the kids food for an hour, but you know what, if I don’t take those calls they don’t get fed at all. What do you think is better for their overall sense of well being and self-esteem? Living in a car and scoring food from food banks? I think not.

My only real fear is that I won’t know when it’s time to back off and plateau for a minute. I don’t want to keep sacrificing more and more and more until I don’t know what my kids look like, but I also want them to have a great life, and hearing people say that all my kids need is my love aned time…well…I had lots of love and time from my mom and I’m still bitter I didn’t get a pony, so yeah, way to look back with that nostalgic hindsight.

Image Credit: graphiteBP