“Attention whore,” “slut with a pen,” “useless ho-bag, “Chiclet-toothed asshole,” “old, ugly and over” (at 26, no less!) and—my personal favorite—“dumber than an autistic child.” Almost immediately after I began writing a dating column several years ago, critics/bloggers tore me apart.
Why? Because I had the “audacity” to be myself—and then market it: Julia Allison™. (Isn’t that terminology totally obnoxious???) To me, this means being outspoken, brutally, sometimes uncomfortably honest, imperfect but positive. This is self-marketing. And every single person should do it.
People get marketing all wrong. They think it’s all about trying to be what other people want. But it’s really about being brave enough to put yourself out there—who you are—and not change in the face of people trying to make you something you’re not. My detractors will never like me. But honestly? Who cares?
For every denigrating comment, I’ll get five e-mails like this: “I must admit I didn’t like you at first…but you’ve won me over with your earnestness and desire for self-discovery.” Or this: “I am repeatedly floored by your honesty, your daily defiance in the face of the haterade-chugging masses.”
Ha. My daily defiance? He should see me when I’m crumpled into the fetal position sobbing on my kitchen floor. It’s been a long, long journey to Julia Allison™.
I grew up as the stereotypical ugly duckling (glasses and braces), reading The Feminine Mystique at age 12, crossing out all the hes in my seventh-grade history textbooks and replacing them with shes. I had boyfriends in high school, but I rarely felt pretty and was deeply insecure. College brought three years of bulimia and a half dozen romantic debacles.
I didn’t feel beautiful and confident at 15, 17 or even 21. It came slowly, and it came with hard work, which is exactly the opposite of what everyone assumes. Attractiveness—the power of seduction, the power to enthrall others—is rarely born. It is made.
And to be honest? A lot of it is just pure marketing. One of the most difficult parts of dating in New York is standing out. That’s why as a single person these days—male or female— marketing yourself outright is a necessary skill.
We all market ourselves: We do it at every job interview or first date. Does that well-honed persona perfectly represent every facet of our complicated, multidimensional selves? Of course not. But if you’re marketing yourself properly, it should not only be an amplified representation of your most important qualities now, but also point toward your future and the person you are becoming.
So why is marketing yourself effectively so damned hard, and why does it initially feel so disingenuous? Probably because most of us are still struggling to figure out who we are and who we want to be. At the same time, we’re so worried that who we are is not enough (not smart enough or beautiful enough or rich enough or—yeah—lovable enough) that we present this facade to the dating world, which makes us unhappy and even more insecure.
Fortunately, we don’t have to get everyone to date us (or even like us!). In fact, good self-marketing separates the “buyers” we want from the tire kickers we don’t. (You might find me attractive as a person, but someone else might not—and that’s okay.)
Even in the corporate world, good branding is not about putting out a “perfect” facade, however superficially seductive. As marketing pro Seth Godin says, “Good marketers tell a story, but a product for everyone rarely reaches much of anyone.”
If you try to market yourself as something you’re not, you’ll find someone who loves you for that—and not for you. From that point on, it’s easy to believe that we’re not good enough to be loved for who we are, when really we’re not good enough to be loved for who we pretend to be.
No one knows better than me—some people will love you for the same reasons other people hate you.
The cover of this magazine represents one side of me—the side that likes (and learned how) to be “glamorous.” Besides the hair extensions, fake nails, fake eyelashes and those Victoria’s Secret pads you stick in your bra, I had a stylist, a makeup artist, the right lighting, the right angle (yes, I have a “good side”) and, Lord knows, a little Photoshop. And you know what? It was fun.
For any woman who’s had her makeup done professionally, put on that dress and those heels (or maybe the jeans that make your ass look spectacular), you know what I mean. You feel invincible. Is it shallow? Sure. But if it makes you feel good, why shouldn’t you do it? Your look isn’t the only thing that defines you.
Women should be allowed to be sexy and still be smart. To be smart and still be silly. To be a girl’s girl and still love to flirt; to love sex and not be labeled a whore; to be ambitious and assertive and not called a bitch; to be lighthearted and not seen as naive; to be interested in self-growth without being dismissed as self-centered; to be strong without being perfect; to be unhappy without feeling hopeless; and to be happy without feeling guilty.
I believe all this, but let me tell you—good luck. Good luck with that, ladies. Whether we like it or not, a lot of those traits are seen as mutually exclusive.
The truth is, most times I’m in my lint-covered sweats. No makeup, hair in a braid or a ponytail. Glasses. But that doesn’t mean I don’t get a big kick out of creating JuliaTM. Maybe because it’s so created. I have a choice, and I like that.
Excuse me for being obvious here, but there’s no need for your personal brand to be one thing: beauty, intellect, a guy’s girl, whatever. I think we tend to forget that men don’t want just a sex object or just a brain or just a girl they can be friends with—they want all three.
And lucky for them, most women are combinations of all three—and they should absolutely market themselves as such.
Ultimately, self-marketing isn’t about lying, or hiding parts of who you are. Self-marketing is about distilling the quintessential you into a short, cohesive narrative.
I like the color pink, my small white dog, costumes and pretty dresses. And yeah, I like attention. It’s fun when it’s positive, not at all when it’s negative. I like my enthusiasm and my cheesiness, and I don’t believe cynicism is a synonym for intelligence. And I like telling you that I sure as hell don’t have everything figured out. I can be sexy and intelligent and optimistic and fun and thoughtful and a good friend—all at the same time. If you don’t see that in me, then honestly, I don’t want to date you anyway.
But if I convey that to someone effectively, that’s good marketing.
