Digital Hustling Tips From an Almost Dead City

I joined advertising because I thought advertising is cool. I had not an iota of an idea what the hell copywriting is. When I joined copywriting, Kolkata was already a dead city. People left Kolkata because they didn’t want to become zombies. I also left Kolkata to become a copywriter with the fear that zombies will kill me if I stay. I didn’t want to become a zombie. I went to NOIDA and joined an advertising agency there as a junior copywriter. But that was it. I returned to Kolkata empty-handed.

In Kolkata, I had thrown into the world of SEO, let say, by market forces. Unknowingly, I was into the digital marketing world. And to survive in the digital marketing world, you need to hustle. I started writing copies for Google Ads and Facebook Ads. But I didn’t consider them as copies. I thought they were content. I felt I was doing content writing. I also thought zombies are conspiring against me in becoming a copywriter. I started writing 2-3 blogs every day. F**k. I thought I was helping society. I didn’t know the content marketing business. I heard the term content marketing funnel quite later. I didn’t realize that very few people read blogs written by me. Nowadays, bots are also reading blogs. Maybe the headlines are not click-baiting.

I thought that work was shit, and great content is website content. I changed agencies only to write website content. I thought writing website content was ideal, and SEO was shit. What the hell. It is digital marketing, baby. By the way, when I use the word writing, I mean hustling. When I write, I do everything- from stealing, copying, ripping off to spinning.

Suddenly, one day, I become a social media copywriter/hustler. I started to handle 16-17 clients- the beginning of the madness. Social media is a place for hustlers. Social media copywriting pushed me a level higher. Strategizing, campaigning, and writing- all learned at this dead city. Out of the blues, I got the opportunity for writing scripts for 2D animation films.

I went to Mumbai to work and returned empty-handed, just like NOIDA. In 2019, I had my copywriting awakening. I realized I was producing mediocre kinds of stuff. Mediocre stuff doesn’t work in dead places. For the last five years, I did hustling. Now I’m in the hustling-to-writing phase.

Now, I want to shift. Shift to mainline advertising. But pundits are saying it is the era of digital advertising. But who cares about pundits. Am I on the right path?

(Image source: Pixabay)