In between bookings and day jobs, clients seem to think we do a whole lot of spending money and being fabulous. I have a secret to let you in on: yeah, we're fabulous all the time, but when our availability says "booked out", that doesn't usually mean we have back to back bookings all day. It means we have a few bookings, then a bunch of personal time, and a huge, painful chunk of admin. This blog is kind of a big ol' whine about all the admin we have to do.
Our email and SMS inboxes are full of things to weed through and reply to, and always, there'll be a few clients in there with whom booking is such a drawn out process, because getting the information from them is like pulling teeth. Back and forth for 18 messages, and finally you have everything you need, but you're dreading the booking because he was so hard to deal with in writing... Thankfully they're usually fine during the booking, but multiply that one guy by about seven, and that's our daily struggle. Then weeding through the time wasters as well, because replying professionally to every message is important in case they are actually a paying client.
And so on... You can see how this takes up time! 14 messages in and all my friend has is the time, service, and duration. And you can bet that he'll have not read her ad, so he'll ask for something not on the list during the booking! You have to screen each one of these contacts too, which takes some time. References mean contacting the escort whose name they gave, and also checking that she's a legitimate service provider as well. All the other screening methods we use (which I won't discuss, because I'd prefer if clients didn't try to get around them), also take time. And this is not taking into account all of the little social messages many clients try to get in - asking you about your day or telling you things about themselves. It can get exhausting!
Then there's ad maintenance - updating, bumping, reviewing, double checking - on all the different platforms you're on. Shuffling your photos around, seeing which ones have worked and which haven't. Writing new copy, designing new ads based around that copy, getting mad at the fact that you totally forgot to link things and now you have to edit again. We maintain our social media presence to keep ourselves foremost in client minds, so selfies and clever new statuses are pretty important! Meanwhile, here's me, writing a post whining about admin... But hey, you guys like me for my blogs, right? Right??
Touring escorts have it even harder - researching hotels to make sure they're sex worker friendly and discreet, as well as centrally located and easy to find. Booking travel and accommodation, answering enquiries from numerous different places, maintaining twice or three times as many ads, each tailored to the location they're visiting and its demographic. Then there are the escorts who have multiple personas for different services - Gina does GFE, Sophie is a sub, Diana is a Domme, and Shania does social bookings only; all separated so no one brand is ruined. You need to carefully craft that brand, so much work goes into it.
Lots of us have spreadsheets to track all our spending on ads and how much return they give us for what we pay them to advertise us (and boy, do we pay them). Spreadsheets to remember everything!
We are always updating our websites and looking into where we're going to shoot next, and with whom. We research other workers' advertising to see what's working for them, to get inspiration for said shoots, and also to just stalk hot people because why not. We network with other workers to see if we can find new potential doubles partners and safety buddies, and of course, new friends. I, personally, have about ten blog drafts at all times, in various stages of completion. I'm sure some I will never publish at all, but many are future projects - you don't even know how long this sat in my drafts folder (it was exactly three months, I just checked)!
TL;DR: Admin sucks, we're fabulous at all times but sometimes still have to do paperwork. Ho life has unavoidable paperwork too.