I write this as I fly in a comfortable seat in Business Class from Europe to Asia.
The woman in the seat in front of me caught my attention.
Blonde with vague Slavic features, fit, pretty and certainly younger than 40 and clad in branded premium gym gear and expensive jewellery. I guessed she could be a model. Or a high-level courtesan between international assignments.
The moment she opened her phone and started a photo gallery application the mystery was solved: an influencer specializing in beachwear, beach gear and accessories.
Like many other features of the Interwebz influencing is a cocktail of hype, exaggerations, smoke and mirrors, wrapped in lust and grees.
Sources say that more than 50% of kids in Generation Z want to be influencers but only 0.5% make more than 50-thousand US dollars a year: a fresh graduate of electrical engineering gets a similar salary in their first full time employment.
Think about that for a second. The lifespan of an electrical engineer is 30 to 50 years and depending on your career progression, your last salary could be 15 or 20 times larger than your first check.
You could even be the owner of your own brand, like Bill Hewlett or Steve Wozniak.
A rich nerd.
Successful influencing is a full-time job and the pretty woman in seat 2A was working the ropes of her profession -images of the modelling sessions flashed in the screen of her mobile whilst she scanned for the better shots. Nimble taps of her fingers retouched and cropped shots of her in swimsuits of different colours, with accessories and sunglasses to match.
She was uploading to Instagram at the same time she edited the photos, as the flight had in-built WiFi for Business Class passengers. Like a well trained athlete, her movements were gracious and frugal, to obtain the maximum amount of editing with the minimum of exertion. And the results were quite good, all in a PG-rated Vogue-like glamour.
The woman in seat 2A was really working in her chosen career with dedication and passion. Such that I have not seen in the majority of “full time job” people.